Angry reaction to Shambo ruling (Sacred Cow With TB Cannot be Slaughtered in the UK)

Some politicians and farming community members have reacted angrily to a High Court decision to quash a destruction order on a "sacred" bullock Shambo. Shambo, who lives at the Skanda Vale multi-faith temple in Carmarthenshire, tested positive for bovine TB after a routine screening.

A High Court judge ruled that the assembly government acted unlawfully in ordering his slaughter.

"This ludicrous ruling contradicts the principles upon which successful TB eradication programmes throughout the world have been based for generations," said Evan R Thomas from the FUW.

"It flies in the face of common sense. It seems that the British justice system is now content to put human health and animal welfare at grave risk.

"Today's ruling could set disease control in Britain back by 70 years," Mr Thomas added.

Veterinary officials were scheduled to slaughter the six-year-old Frisian after the Hindu monks were given notification on 5 May.

Monks at the temple and supporters launched a campaign to save Shambo, saying it would violate their religious principles and human rights.

On 3 July, Rural Development Minister, Jane Davidson, announced he would be slaughtered but allowed the monks time to launch an application for a judicial review.

But farmers and some AMs have said Shambo should face the same fate as other cattle.

Last year, 5,220 cattle in Wales alone were culled because they failed the TB test.

Labour AM Alun Davies, chair of the assembly's rural development sub-committee, said: "It's one of the most ludicrous rulings I've heard from any judge for quite some time.

It sends out completely the wrong message to the farming industry and those working and living in the countryside

Other members of the opposition parties including Montgomeryshire farmer and Liberal Democrat AM, Mick Bates, have questioned the decision to spare Shambo.

"This decision is a blow to every farmer in Wales who have lost animals to bovine TB.

"The High Court decision puts assembly government plans to control the disease in jeopardy," Mr Bates added.

"The farming industry is already reaching crisis point because of bovine TB. To allow decisions like this allows the crisis to get worse.

Tory shadow rural affairs minister Brynle Williams said: "This is an incomprehensible decision.

"It sends out completely the wrong message to the farming industry and those working and living in the countryside."

He said he recognised the sensitivity of the case but fully expected the High Court to endorse the assembly's position.

The National Farmers' Union (NFU) also expressed concern at the High Court decision.

"This decision is an absolute kick in the teeth for all those farmers who have had animals destroyed as part of the bovine TB controls," Dai Davies, president of NFU Cymru said.

He added that farmers had faced culling animals which had often taken generations of careful selective breed improvement to produce.

"Bovine TB is running wild in the livestock industry in this country and everyone is working towards eradicating this awful disease.

"This is a decision which saves one animal but at the expense of hundreds if not thousands of other animals," Mr Davies said.

A Multicultural Shamboles The UK continues to lead the way in multicultural madness. The latest instance is 'Shambo', a "sacred" bullock, who resides at the Skanda Value multi-faith temple, and has contracted TB. Shambo's Hindu owners have been trying to save him from the destruction he is due on the grounds of religious principles and human rights.

The high court, in the general manner of such courts, has decided to quash the destruction order, once again proving the principle that men wearing dresses aren't necessarily the best judges of what is good for society.

In disease of multiculturalism may now infect thousands of other cattle.

Shambo's case is just another clear example of why multiculturalism, taken to extremes, actually hurts.

I thought I read yesterday that he HAD been slaughtered

You are right, the Bull is dead. But the issue lives on. In the USA, we need to think hard about what to do in case we have a minority religion that considers animals sacred and find out later that the animal they hold sacred has a contagious disease.

See here :

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/27/europe/EU-GEN-Britain-Faith-and-Law.php

LONDON: A Hindu monastery in a quiet corner of Wales seems an unlikely locale for dissent. But the seizure of Shambo the bull from Skanda Vale and his subsequent slaughter underlined the difficulties Britain faces in accommodating its wide array of religions.

Hindus, Muslims and Christians have seized on the Shambo case to complain that the government is interfering in their spiritual lives.

Shambo was taken away from the monastery on Thursday at the end of a long and public battle between Hindus who revere bulls and authorities who said he must be killed because he had tested positive for tuberculosis.

Officials said they had to prevent the disease's spread. The monks argued that Shambo could be effectively isolated and claimed the death sentence trampled on their religious rights.

More than 100 devotees prayed and chanted in front of the bull for hours, trying to prevent authorities from taking him; police eventually had to drag some away.

Christians have also complained of state interference in their spiritual lives.

Some groups criticized a court decision this month banning a teenage girl from wearing a "chastity ring" at school. They were also upset over a British Airways directive that a flight attendant could not wear a cross where it was visible to passengers.

The Guardian newspaper commented Friday that the Shambo case was "utterly disastrous" for the government's image.

"Images of burly police officers carrying off Hindu worshippers, cutting their way into a temple and leading off a healthy-looking bull for slaughter do not play well," it said.

The concerns about the intersection of religion and law often cut across conventional political lines.

When Prime Minister Gordon Brown proposed this week that Britain extend the time it can hold terrorism suspects without charge, both Conservatives and Liberal Democrats objected — joining Muslims who claimed such a measure would single them out for further police pressure.

Concerns about government interference also lead to occasional cross-faith cooperation.

A Church of Wales bishop, Carl Cooper, recently wrote that both the airline's cross controversy and moves to limit Muslim women wearing veils show "freedom of religious expression should be valued and respected, not least by our political leaders."

After the Shambo slaughter, Britain's Hindu Forum called for a meeting with the government's environment secretary to discuss how other temple animals could be protected.

"There need to be other options than killing. That's the only option they have offered," group spokesman Sanjay Mistry said. He did not lay out any proposals, however.

For some, the only option is to follow the letter of the law, regardless of religious concerns.

"We do not live in a theocracy, and democratically enacted legislation must be observed and respected by everyone," said Keith Porteous Wood, director of the National Secular Society.

He also complained that the Shambo controversy was "religious belligerence (that) must have cost the public purse many tens of thousands of pounds (dollars, euros) in legal action and already hard-stretched police time."

There may be more controversy to come at the monastery.

The Welsh Assembly, the regional government, said Friday that a post-mortem on Shambo confirmed he had tuberculosis and this means other animals in Skanda Vale's menagerie may be infected and potentially subject to slaughter.

Apparently badgers are a major source of this in the UK, and there are ongoing debates about whether culling the badger population is an effective way to reduce the TB spread. Either way, completely exterminating a wisely distributed native wildlife species is not a reasonable measure, and is not being suggested by anyone.
http://www.farmersguardian.com/story.asp?sectioncode=24&storycode=11555
http://www.mayoadvertiser.com/index.php?aid=2615
According to the vets quoted in the first story, badgers are the main source of bovine TB, and even the authorities attribute 40% of bovine TB to badgers. It’s completely unreasonable to order the slaughter of this tightly controlled bull, while thousands of infected badgers continue scampering through cattle pastures all over the country.

But even if Shambo originally caught it from another farm animal, he could certainly be isolated after that. It’s not like he was an agribusiness beast, being raised for meat or milk in an industrial setting with contact with other animals being raised for meat or milk. I really don’t think that a bull that was kept inside a temple, with reasonable precautions to prevent its caretakers and worshippers from spreading infection outside the temple, would pose a threat to other herds in the UK — certainly not anywhere near the level of threat that the badgers are posing. TB is not that easily transmitted.

Your ignorance is encyclopedic and your desire to trumpet such fact is awe-inspiring. A little info on bovine TB for your stunted grey matter:

Bovine tuberculosis is dangerous to animals and humans because it can spread from animals to people, causing symptoms similar to the human form of the disease. Last year 22,242 infected cattle were culled in the U.K., excluding Northern Ireland.

But please, go ahead and feel free to visit, consort and romp with any TB infected animal. With your lack of IQ, no one will ever know which to shoot, the more intelligent being... or you.

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