Lumley urges Sainsbury’s to drop kangaroo burger range

JOANNA LUMLEY has called for a boycott of Sainsbury’s “cruel” kangaroo burgers, as welfare groups threatened to protest to stop them being sold.

The burgers go on sale this week and will be marketed as a low-fat summer barbecue alternative to beef.

But animal welfare groups are warning the wild kangaroos from which they are made may have been killed barbarically, and are vowing to protest outside the supermarket.

Actress Ms Lumley said she “hated” the idea of the burgers and urged shoppers not to eat them. She told The Daily Telegraph: “If you hate the idea, as I do, of kangaroos and their young being killed and shipped to the UK so that customers here can eat less fat, why not try giving up meat altogether?”

A Sainsbury’s spokesman insisted the burgers, which contain just 3 per cent fat and cost £1.50 per pack, were 100 per cent welfare friendly. She added that managing the kangaroo population was necessary to protect the Australian environment.

Sainsbury’s has previously sold kangaroo burgers but withdrew them in 1999 following protests by vegan group Viva!. Last night, Justin Kerswell, Viva! deputy director, warned the supermarket had again fallen for “lies” over the humane nature of the killing practices used on wild kangeroos, and vowed to take action for a second time.

He said: “We will write to Sainsbury’s and if they refuse to back down we will stage a protest. They have been sold lies from Australia and they have fallen for it hook, line and sinker. [Kangaroos] are not killed in slaughter houses like most animals – they are killed in the wild where their limbs can be accidentally blown off.”

Elisa Allen, the director of the animal welfare group Peta UK, said: “The idea of eating Skippy is enough to turn most people’s stomachs – and rightly so, because kangaroos are intelligent, inquisitive, social animals who are killed in barbaric ways for burgers. In Australia, that typically means a blow to the head or being shot.”

Ms Lumley added: “It is a sad truth that the routine slaughter of pretty much all the animals we eat in the UK is as cruel as these grim methods of killing wild animals.”