The UK Government has given the green light to 800 foreign butchers to work on seasonal visas in the UK. Rob Mutimer, the president of the National Pig Association (NPA), said that Britain was facing an “acute welfare disaster” within weeks, forcing farmers to kill their cattle due to an acute shortage of butchers and butchers.

“We are about to consider mass culling of animals in this country in a few weeks,” he said to the BBC radio show Today on Friday.

“We think that our current deficit is between 100,000 and 120,000. And it’s growing at about 12,000 a week. This is happening on pig farms across the country; they are lagging behind and have no room to keep animals.”

The UK Department of the Environment announced that the 800 butchers would be allowed to enter the country until 31 december by extending the pilot scheme for seasonal workers and working for up to six months.

Environment Minister George Eustice said that the butchers are needed to control the staff shortage in the sector.

”That will help us catch up with the pigs we currently have on the farm, allow meat processing companies to slaughter more pigs and, crucially, we are going to make available so-called private storage aid to help those slaughterhouses temporarily store that meat, ” Eustice told The Financial Times.

The National Pig Association said in a statement that it was “very relieved” to see the latest package of alleviating measures.
Shortage of milkshakes

Keir Starmer, who leads the opposition Labour Party, criticised the new policy for not providing a solution to the national labour shortage. Just last month, the British government said it would issue up to 10 500 temporary work visas to truck drivers and poultry workers who travel long distances.

The Conservative government of Britain has been reluctant to relax immigration restrictions for workers.

This year, the British have felt the effects of sometimes empty shelves in grocery stores, cars queuing for hours at petrol stations because there were not enough truck drivers to transport fuel and even a shortage of milkshakes from McDonald’s.