Andrew Hoggard: Setting the record straight on bobby calf footage

Andrew Hoggard.

Helping some reporters - and by extension the general public - understand what was going on with the recently released bobby calf footage shot by Farmwatch was at times frustrating.

I wasn't happy with some of the coverage, in particular that some of my comments were cut and pasted and put in the wrong context.

In some cases I was trying to explain my views to reporters who hadn't even watched the videos. So I want to set the record straight.

Some media combined footage from last year and last week. My comments were only in relation to the footage covertly filmed in August, and released last month.

I commented last year that I was disgusted by the 2015 scenes, that quite rightly ended up with prosecutions in court.

Farmwatch's recent footage was about six minutes' worth and showed three scenes of truck drivers loading calves, what appeared to be a farm worker dragging a calf across a paddock by a back leg, two scenes of farmers in a paddock loading calves into a trailer, two people on a quad driving up a tanker track with calves in a trailer, and finally two scenes of dead calves waiting for pickup.

I found the loading of the calves into trucks to be on the rough side. With mandatory use of loading facilities next year, this type of scene should hopefully be a thing of the past.

The calf being dragged was unacceptable. If I saw that on my own farm I would give the employee in question a severe dressing down, and disciplinary action would likely follow.

The farmers loading calves in the paddock carefully placed them into the trailers. If anyone sees it differently, feel free to let me know.

I didn't see any animal abuse with the bike towing the trailer. Worksafe might be upset with the two people for lack of helmets, but MPI shouldn't have an issue.

Finally the footage of the slinks: we all know that despite our best efforts calves will die during calving. None of the calves in the footage showed any signs of being euthanased; they had died naturally.

It is sad but unfortunately a reality of farming. If farmers are afraid of putting slinks out for collection, how is that a good thing?

It will result in calves being buried on farms, which is a waste and not the best for the environment.

So while some of the footage showed poor and rough handling, the rest was common farm practice. This is an extremely important nuance that I feel has been missed.

To come out with a blanket condemnation of all the footage, labelling it all as cruelty, would mean condemning the practice of separating calf from mother.

Mashing up footage of standard farm practice with examples of cruel or rough behaviour is an attempt to mislead, and portray all farming as cruel.

Federated Farmers will always condemn animal cruelty where it occurs.

- Andrew Hoggard is the Federated Farmers' Dairy Chair.