Sir, – Over the last few decades I have undergone some operations under general anaesthetic. At no time (thank goodness) did the surgical team offer to render me unconscious by electrical stunning. Indeed, patients who have been given electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) do so under general anaesthetic. Yet many people think that electro stunning must be painless because it is quick and bloodless.

Most animals who are slaughtered die from bleeding from cuts administered after the stunning. As many involved in farming, with our far from exemplary accident rate, will know, bleeding is not of itself painful. What pain that can occur comes from the wound (ask any blood donor).

More than fifty years ago at a Judo class I witnessed one student render another unconscious by applying pressure to the carotid arteries. When the unconscious student revived (after a few seconds) all he reported was surprise at 'falling asleep' (his words) and no pain whatever. It follows that any technique that deprives the brain of a mammal with blood will cause immediate and painless loss of consciousness.

The muslim community are important customers for sheepmeat and it is a disgrace for the ignorant to criticise their time honoured methods of slaughter when it is clear than those criticising confuse bleeding with suffering. It is also of some concern in these pre Brexit times that Scottish housewives buy less sheepmeat than other parts of the UK and the body to whom we are levied money to promote our produce, QMS , is conflicted by having to promote beef at the same time.

Sandy Henderson

Faulds Farm,

Dunblane