Five Dates That Made The Animal Rights Movement

In 2020 a prominent vegan “influencer” claimed the animal rights (AR) movement had begun in 2015. In fact he was wrong by 50 years. Animal protection can be traced back centuries and there were campaigns against vivisection and fur in the Victorian era but the modern movement, in the way we know it today, goes back to the 1960s. Here is a plotted history of AR in Britain since then, in the form of five key dates over four decades.

26/12/1963:

Hunt Saboteurs take to the field.

The Hunt Saboteurs Association was formed in December 1963 by 21 year old freelance photographer, John Prestige (on the right in the photo). Direct action was in the air thanks to anti-nuclear groups like the Committee of 100 in the UK and the civil rights movement in the USA.

He told the Daily Herald: “We aim to make it impossible for people to hunt by confusing the hounds. The movement is being financed by a small legacy of mine and the 2/6d membership fee”. One hundred members were enrolled in the first week and Prestige received 1000 letters in the first ten days. Two large donations totalling £1000 meant he could set up a small office in Brixton, Devon.

The first HSA strike took place on Boxing Day 1963 against the South Devon Foxhounds. Over 30 years later Prestige told the HSA: “We did so well that day that they cancelled the hunt. The local butcher gave us 50 pounds of meat and we fed it to the hounds. We used hunting horns. Nothing like that had ever really happened before and it caused absolute chaos! We did a lot of research on horn-blowing and did the job very, very well. The police were completely bemused”.

Prestige’s small group of saboteurs went into action for the second time on 10th January 1964, again against the South Devon hunt. HSA groups sprung up throughout the West of England and by the end of 1964 an estimated 120 sabs had taken place.

Tactics included horn blowing, spraying aniseed to take hounds off the fox’s scent and tipping “highly flavoured meat” off the back of a landrover in front of hounds. That year saw the first arrests of sabs and reprisals by hunt heavies but the HSA kept on growing during subsequent decades and became the main route into direct action for activists.

17/06/1975:

The ICI smoking beagles raid

On 17th June 1975 three beagles used by multinational chemical giant ICI were rescued by Mike Huskisson and John Bryant. The dogs, like those in the photo were forced to inhale cigarette smoke to test an allegedly “safe” cigarette.

This image (below) had appeared on the front page of the Sunday People in January 1975 and caused national outrage. It was taken by undercover reporter Mary Beith, who took a job at the ICI laboratory in Cheshire to expose the scandal.

“Their heads were restrained by locking boards in place like medieval stocks. The dogs were then lifted on to trolleys to the smoking platforms and the masks, valves and tubes were fixed to their faces,” she later said. Some of the beagles were forced to smoke as many as 30 cigarettes per day.

Opposition to animal testing was growing. Protests were held against the experiments and the same year the book Victims of Science was published. The term “speciesism” had also been coined to describe the exclusion of nonhuman animals from rights granted to humans.

The raid itself received national publicity. Mike and John were arrested and appeared in court in December but the prosecution offered no evidence. ICI was afraid of adverse publicity resulting from a trial. Both defendants agreed to be bound over to keep the peace and the charges were dropped. Afterwards Mike said: “It is terrific, we have won. My actions have been vindicated.”

This was the first time laboratory animals had been rescued but direct action against vivisection began three years earlier when Ronnie Lee formed the Band of Mercy. In 1975 he was in gaol after being convicted of arson against a laboratory but on his release he founded the Animal Liberation Front.

04/11/1982:

The Animals Film broadcast on Channel 4 television

Channel 4 was the first new TV station for nearly 20 years and its launch was a landmark event. Three days later on 4th November 1982 it broadcast The Animals

Film - a feature length documentary which covered every aspect of animal abuse in graphic detail and sent shockwaves across the country.

The film was made by Victor Schonfeld and Myriam Alaux and went on cinema release in 1982 at a time when interest in animal rights was burgeoning. That year saw a record number of ALF raids, national and local protests (including a 5,000 strong march to the Ministry of Defence weapons base at Porton Down) and heightened media interest.

What drove this upsurge was direct action, in particular the rising number of ALF attacks on laboratories. When Life Sciences Research in Essex was raided in February, with nine beagles and 100 rodents liberated and over £100,000 in damage, The Daily Mirror headline was “Rescued: hooded raiders free lab dogs”, alongside an iconic photo of a masked activist holding a beagle.

Local AR groups publicised the film when it was shown in cinemas. On the evening of 4 November, activists handed out leaflets at train stations, asking people to watch the film when they got home.

Film censors passed the film uncut for cinemas. However the Independent Broadcasting Authority told Channel 4 to cut certain scenes depicting an ALF raid on a battery farm because they could “incite crime or lead to civil disorder”. This raised the film’s profile even further and ensured even more people watched it.

The Animals Film has been described as “an important moment in the growth of public awareness of animal exploitation” and it helped propel an era of militant activism.

01/02/1995:

Jill Phipps is killed on a live exports demonstration

On 1st February 1995 Jill Phipps was killed by a lorry taking calves into Coventry Airport for export by the veal trade. She was not the first activist to die – two hunt saboteurs, Mike Hill and Thomas Worby, had been killed earlier that decade - but her shocking and tragic death resonated across the world.

Due to protests and public outcry, all major passenger ferry companies had pulled out of live animal exports by the autumn of 1994 but, seeing a commercial opportunity, Phoenix Aviation began running up to five flights of calves out of Coventry Airport each day.

Jill was part of a small group who broke through a police line to stop a lorry from delivering calves. According to a witness the police “were so keen to protect the business of this filthy firm that they had made little effort to ensure the way was clear… the truck driver moved off at speed, knocking Jill down and crushing her under his wheels.”

A group of people, many of whom were Jill’s friends, trashed the company director’s house later the same day. Protesters also set up camp outside the airport for months to come and many ran onto the airfield to try to stop aircraft taking off when live exports resumed. One was Jill’s partner who chained himself to the wheels of a plane. They were the first of over 300 people arrested during the campaign.

Jill’s funeral at Coventry Cathedral was attended by 1000 mourners. Over the next three months activists fought a war of attrition with police, whose resolve and finances were gradually worn down. As a result police began limiting the number of flights and they were suspended in May. In July Phoenix Aviation went into liquidation.

Jill’s memory lived on and she became an inspirational figure. Ten years after she died hundreds marched through Coventry to remember her.

16/02/2003:

“Where does the animal rights movement go from here?”

On 16 February 2003 the Animal Rights Coalition held a special meeting entitled: “Where does the animal rights movement go from here?” ARC was an umbrella organisation for local AR groups set up by Neil Lea. Grassroots campaigns had grown enormously and the most important anti-vivisection group of this era was Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty.

SHAC targeted the animal research laboratory Huntingdon Life Sciences. The campaign was initially successful and HLS almost went bankrupt, but by late 2002 it was not in imminent danger. There were also wider concerns such as declining numbers and increasing police repression. Campaigning was becoming less effective.

Over the next three months activists fought a war of attrition with police, whose resolve and finances were gradually worn down. As a result police began limiting the number of flights and they were suspended in May. In July Phoenix Aviation went into liquidation.

The idea for the meeting grew from email conversations and ARC said: “Many activists feel that the time has come to re-evaluate how we are campaigning.”

About 80 people attended and the vast majority felt changes were necessary.

What makes this meeting important is how this was put into action. A discussion on vivisection led to the formation of Stop Primate Experiments At Cambridge which successfully prevented a new laboratory being built there.

Following this victory SPE- AC became Speak and focused on a new biosciences laboratory in Oxford. Direct

action halted construction in July 2004 and work did not resume until the following year after the Labour government backed it to the tune of £100m. The laboratory finally opened in 2008.

Until 2002 most AR activists did not actually campaign for veganism. Mary and Neil Lea spoke about their first free vegan food fair at the meeting, inspiring activists from London to organise their own free vegan food fairs and set up London Vegan Campaigns in 2005. Other vegan campaigning groups were formed around the country.

In 2008 LVC organised the first Vegan Pledge, where a group of people were invited to go vegan for one month. The idea was taken up by Animal Aid, the Vegan Society and eventually Veganuary. In 2020 400,000 people signed up to Veganuary showing how popular veganism has become.

Conclusion

Selecting five dates with which to tell the history of the AR movement is incredibly difficult. I’m sure many of you will disagree with my choices. Please contribute with alternatives, including more recent examples if you wish.

By Paul Gravett