Fate of pet pigs enough to make a grown chef cry

LONDON - Gordon Ramsay's reputation as the tough-guy of British cuisine was dented this week when Channel Four screened footage of his pet pigs being taken to the abattoir.

Viewers of Ramsay's series The F-Word saw Ramsay moved almost to tears, as he watched the Berkshire sows, Trinny and Susannah, go under the knife.

Looking pale and visibly shaken, the Glaswegian chef saw the 24-month-old pigs stunned by an electric shock to the brain, before being shackled by the hind legs and hoisted to the ceiling. Their throats were then unceremoniously slit.

Ramsay's grisly ordeal didn't end there. During the sequence the dead pigs began "gurgling" as blood poured from their bodies, and kicking due to an apparent nervous reaction. He was then forced to watch as the bodies of Trinny and Susannah - named after the TV fashion gurus - were put into a scalding tank. They were later shaved and disembowelled, and hung in a meat store.

It was Ramsay's first visit to an abattoir and he struggled to describe his feelings. "Not pleasant," he said. "The whole operation is extraordinary. Quite emotional really. I felt sick as a *** dog in there. Next I will think of something really nice to cook with them. But it's not a nice experience."

Earlier in the nine-part TV series, Ramsay has been shown fattening the pigs in the garden of his Wandsworth home. Next week, he will feed them to diners in a Chelsea restaurant created for the programme.

The decision to screen graphic footage of the slaughter process was approved by the animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which lobbies against the meat and farming industries.

Last week, they wrote to Ramsay urging him not to "censor" footage of the moment of slaughter.

A spokesman for the group said: "Paul McCartney once said that if slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegetarian. If the F-Word slaughter turns out to be as graphic and gory as we hear it is, then these animals' deaths will not have been completely in vain, since they will turn many compassionate people into vegetarians."

On the first series of the show, 27 viewers contacted Britain's TV watchdog after footage of six of Ramsay's pet turkeys being killed was screened.

The watchdog, Ofcom, later cleared the broadcaster, saying viewers had been given plenty of warning about what was likely to happen. "There were no unduly distressing scenes," it said.

Channel Four decided to screen the abattoir footage in the second series at a later hour to avoid further complaints.

* The first series is being shown in New Zealand on Saturdays (TV1, 7.30pm).

- INDEPENDENT