To think the new halal and kosher labelling bill is a great idea?

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https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2026-02-24/debates/8FDB8A16-AE50-4246-ADC9-70191907499B/FoodLabelling(HalalAndKosherMeat)

personally I’m not bothered that meat is killed in certain ways, I think if you eat meat you need to make peace with the entire process being pretty horrible for the animals.

But if you’re going to have issues with halal slaughter, you also need to have an issue with kosher slaughter. It’s the exact same process, just with different prayers said. The slaughter process is the same in both methods - the animal has its throat slit and they are left to have the blood drain out.

I don't eat meat so this won't affect me directly.

I don't think labelling meat as halal or kosher is particularly useful, except for people with religious restrictions on their diets - so Jews, Muslims and Sikhs (because they are not supposed to eat ritually slaughtered meat).

I would welcome labelling as to whether the product was stunned/non-stunned, but I don't think that alone would be sufficient information for anyone with concerns about animal welfare. Perhaps all meat should be sold with a factual statement (no spin!) about the conditions in which the animal was kept while alive and the method by which it was killed? Then people could make truly informed choices about what they were eating.

Personally I’d like to avoid kosher meat. Not stunning the animal in any circumstances is incredibly cruel.

But there are lots of practices within the meat industry which are unspeakable cruel. Wouldn't you want to avoid those too?

As I said in my post, I think if you’re going to eat meat you have to accept, one some level, there is cruelty involved.

I was a vegetarian for nearly 10 years. Had to stop due to illness and disordered eating. I’d love to go back but it’s just not feasible for me.

I also don't understand this comment as it seems to be the opposite of what you've said in the OP about not caring how the animal is killed.

Stunned doesn’t necessarily mean an animal can’t feel the slaughter. The slit throat means that the death is almost instant with the halal/kosher method of slaughter so whilst it sounds more painful, the loss of consciousness within seconds means it’s over quickly then the draining of blood takes place for hygiene reasons. Stunned processes often take longer and as the stun lasts momentarily it can be more traumatic for the animals. Stunning by can be like paralysis, seeing, hearing and knowing you’re being killed with no way of stopping it. Also halal and kosher is not just about the way an animal is slaughtered and a prayer. An animal cannot be sick, old, diseased etc and also must be looked after before slaughter.

I welcome this. I eat mostly vegetarian and moving towards a plant based diet due to the horror of this industry. I actively avoid halal and also do not believe we should be saying Muslim prayers in slaughterhouses in the Uk.

I agree with labelling and agree they should be treated the same but I assume all the anti groups focused on halal are because it's much more widespread and there are huge pushes for it in a way that there aren't with kosher. Two years ago all DC's school started using all halal meat, all local takeaways use halal meat, etc.

Kosher meat has always been labelled as such. Only a kosher restaurant/butcher would stock kosher meat as it’s so expensive - this is due to the stringent laws of kashrut and having a qualified person on the premises to ensure the laws are observed..
Certain supermarkets may stock it in areas where Jews reside, but it will be in the kosher section so no-one would inadvertently buy it.
Halal is different as many restaurants use halal to cater for Muslims. It’s usually indicated on the menu.

So as I understand it, the situation is that:
When people are buying meat, only about 5% of meat-consumers actually want their meat to be Halal/Kosher.
However, if a herd/flock of animals/birds is ready for the slaughterhouse the owner often doesn't at that point know who their immediate customer (the "middle man" processor who prepares and packages the meat for sale) is going to be.
If they use a non-religious slaughter method their market of potential buyers will be 5% smaller than if they use a religious method. If you use the "wrong" method for some buyers you might end up not making a sale or having the whole batch downgraded for pet food if you can't match to a buyer so it makes sense to use the religious slaughter method unless you already have a deal made with a processor who isn't looking for religiously-slaughtered meat.

But this is based on the assumption that everyone who doesn't want halal/kosher meat doesn't give a monkeys about slaughter method. If all meat has to be labelled with its slaughter method then the balance of decision making would shift because the unknown factor is how many meat consumers would actively avoid buying religiously slaughtered meat. If that turns out to be more than 5% then you get the same market-contraction either way so it will be more important to have an advance arrangement with a buyer.

The overall effect in the supermarket will be all meat going up in price by about 2-3% because of the loss in market efficiency.

Absolutely spot on!

We need meat. All vitamins are bioavailable in meat unlike plants. You get everything your body needs in meat, unlike plants.

@JHound, we have a law in this country that animals must be stunned before slaughter. Animals slaughtered for Halal and Kosher meat are currently exempted from this law and as a result experience greater suffering. You don’t care how much suffering those animals experience? Dear God!

@UniquePinkSwan , how ill informed you are.

@ExtraOnions , I don’t believe that’s true at all. I do not believe that we should accept in our nation a method of slaughter which subjects the animals to unnecessary suffering whichever sky fairy’s name that slaughter is carried out in.

I’d like to be able to avoid meat that hadn’t been stunned or had been recoverable-ly stunned prior to being killed and to be honestly I find it pretty disgraceful the it’s allowed to happen in this country anyway.

I’d be all for a ban of religiously slaughtered meat. We’re supposed to be a country of animal lovers if sticking by that means a minority have to eat more vegetables then 🤷🏽‍♀️

But as a former vegetarian, you're ok with the incredible cruelty in the dairy and egg industry? The focus on some imaginary special privileges for kosher meat and the people who eat it seems oddly selective, I wonder why. If you want to avoid it, just don't buy meat labelled as kosher.

everyone wants a finger in the pie.

Speak for yourself, especially considering human fingers contain no muscle.

Hold on, if there is no label how do these facebook groups know that most supermarket meat is halal, and also what would be the point? Because if its halal but not labelled as such muslims won't buy it?

Sounds like we need a few facts from reputable sources....

Agree with this. Although one thing I have learned recently, is that the hindquarters of an animal are rarely eaten by Jews. This obviously means that half of the carcass of each kosher slaughtered animal goes into the usual human food chain - ie, it’s been religiously slaughtered, not stunned, but isn’t labelled as kosher because Jews don’t want to eat it. This is why the Facebook groups have come about, because people are unknowingly buying religiously slaughtered meat.

Similar with halal slaughter. Once the halal butchers have all the meat they need to process from the halal slaughterhouses, any ‘excess’ just gets sent to normal butchers. It isn’t labelled as halal, because technically it isn’t as it hasn’t been processed by a halal butcher, but the animal has still been religiously slaughtered.

In my opinion, if it’s not acceptable to inadvertently give a muslim / Jew non halal / kosher meat, then it’s not acceptable to give a non-muslim / Jew with concerns about animal welfare, religiously slaughtered meat.

That’s a shame. Perhaps it’ll happen at some point. Most get clear labelling around food is a good idea and this is part of that.

Why don’t Jews want to stun the animal first? Surely they have welfare concerns.

Makes no difference to me - we don't need to eat animals.

The whole lifespan of an animal bred for their flesh, or eggs/milk is cruel and it blows my mind how any one can still partake in farming animals for food.

To be fair, by the time the slaughter comes around the animals would probably be glad their short life of torture is at an end.

Halal labelling is utterly meaningless and is a dogwhistle.

Labelling that makes clear the method of slaughter would be meaningful to assist consumers in making decisions based on (relative) welfare grounds.

The vast majority of halal meat comes from animals stunned before slaughter, so undifferentiated 'halal' labelling doesn't provide useful information.

It is the case. The vast majority is stunned. It is very difficult to find halal butchers that only sells unstunned meat.