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Thousands of Chickens Could Suffer in Breeder Farm – Tell the Council You Object!

A planning application has been submitted for a huge chicken breeder farm in Oxfordshire. Tell the council you object!

Stefano Belacchi / Animal Equality / We Animals

The site would house approximately 39,600 birds (including 36,000 females plus males) and produce thousands of birds destined to suffer on filthy broiler farms. Broiler breeder farms keep hens and roosters to produce fertile eggs, which are then sent to hatcheries to become chickens raised for meat – meaning this proposal would help drive yet more intensive chicken farming.

If approved, this proposal would condemn tens of thousands of chickens to miserable, stressful lives, while potentially increasing pollution, public health risks, and damage to the local environment. 
 

Read Less -

Someone, Not Something

Chickens are thinking, feeling individuals. Each one has their own personality, preferences, and strong desire to live. They are someone, not something. Despite this, a billion are killed for meat each year in the UK alone. 

Bred to Suffer

This proposal is for a broiler breeder site – meaning hens and roosters would be kept to produce eggs for the meat industry.  Chickens exploited for their flesh have been selectively bred for unnaturally rapid growth, which causes debilitating health issues, including lameness, heart problems, and breathing difficulties. All this so they can grow fast enough to be killed at just six weeks old. 

Threats to Public Health

Industrial poultry units housing tens of thousands of stressed animals are well documented breeding grounds for disease. Avian influenza continues to devastate farming systems across the UK, resulting in the killing of millions of birds. Local councils have a moral duty to resist planning applications for farms that may increase the risk of future outbreaks and associated public health harms. 

Environmental Damage

Animal agriculture is a leading driver of environmental destruction – and intensive poultry farming is a major contributor to air and water pollution. During rainfall events or in the event of storage or handling failures, contaminants such as manure, nitrogen, phosphorus, and bacteria can move rapidly onto nearby land and into waterways. 

The local ecosystem does not need further pressure from a facility that would generate large volumes of manure and ammonia emissions, alongside additional transport and infrastructure impacts. 
 

Please Take Action

West Oxfordshire District Council must reject this proposal. Sign our petition today.

Please use your full name and email. Invalid entries will be removed from the petition. Please note that the council may publish your name along with comments related to this application.
 

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Sign the Petition Today

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To: Alistair Wray (West Oxfordshire District Council)

Re: Planning application 26/00770/FUL 

Dear Cllr Wray,

We are writing to object to planning application 26/00770/FUL, which seeks permission for a broiler breeder (chicken breeding) farm comprising four poultry buildings and associated works at Deanery Farm, Station Road, Bampton, Oxfordshire OX18 2AP. 

We urge the council to refuse this application for the following reasons (in line with relevant material planning considerations):

•    Odour and quality of life: Operations at the site – including the accumulation of animal waste and the handling and disposal of dead birds – are likely to generate strong and persistent odours. Intensive livestock rearing falls within highly offensive odour categories and could negatively impact nearby residents and visitors. 

•    Air pollution and ammonia emissions: Large scale poultry farming produces significant ammonia emissions from animal waste, which can harm air quality, wildlife, and surrounding habitats and may negatively affect human health.

•    Climate and sustainability concerns: England’s planning framework requires decision makers to consider climate impacts and support the transition to a low carbon future. However, animal agriculture is a leading driver of greenhouse gas emissions and environmental degradation. Approving new intensive animal farms would likely exacerbate these crises. 

•    Public health concerns: Large scale poultry facilities heighten the risk of disease outbreaks, including avian influenza. Councils have a responsibility to prevent developments that pose foreseeable risks to public health. 

•    Animal welfare and sentience: The Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act recognises animals as living, feeling beings. Chickens used in breeding and meat production systems are subjected to severe confinement and stressful industrial conditions, and the broader industry this site supplies relies on confining and killing chickens on a mass scale. We urge the council to take the ethical implications seriously alongside the significant environmental and community harms associated with intensive poultry development.

For these reasons, we respectfully ask the council to reject this application and prioritise the protection of local communities, public health, and the environment.

Yours sincerely,
 

Act Now

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