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Keep all fireworks off supermarket shelves this year
Freddy B.
started this petition to
Aldi, Asda, Booths, Co-op, Iceland, Lidl, M&S, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Waitrose
The unregulated use of fireworks in the UK has become a pervasive
source of distress and danger.
The suffering of companion animals due to fireworks is undeniable, causing stress, distress and trauma from explosions, sometimes leading to them running away from home, having seizures and even dying from the terror , to the heartbreak of their families.
“ I had to say goodbye to my beautiful boy last night”, writes Sarah Frost about her 12 year-old rescue dog Derry, “He was literally scared to death by fireworks. He had a fit he was unable to recover from – please please people think of pets and wild animals before you go letting off fireworks in your back gardens. I am absolutely heartbroken .”
Tragedies like this are all too common, and entirely avoidable . Farmed animals are also terrorised , often running away in abject fear of the smoke and the noise. Wild animals, too, are petrified often having their habitats destroyed by bonfires and their air polluted by the harmful gas released from the explosives.
The article The Devastating Effects of Fireworks on Pets and Wildlife | The MIT Press Reader (https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-devastating-effects-of-fireworks-on-pets-and-wildlife/) by Dr Kendra Coulter, a leading expert on animals and work, animal protection policy, fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics and Member of the City of London’s Animal Welfare Advisory Committee, explains the precise risks of fireworks on wild and companion animals, in particular, in the bizarre tradition of celebrating with methods which are known to cause serious and sometimes fatal harm.
There are also grave concerns expressed on the effects of fireworks on people with autism, PTSD, other sensory-related neurodivergence, and new-born babies .
Moreover, fireworks have led to a significant increase in incidents related to personal injury , putting our NHS staff under undue pressure around the fireworks season, as well as causing damage to property and alarming levels of noise pollution . Every year, particularly although not exclusively around Bonfire Night, we witness numerous instances of firework-related accidents – as we saw last November in Dundee and around Glasgow where fireworks were used as weapons against police officers.
While Animal Concern works on our UK-wide campaign to ban the sale of fireworks to the general public - we are calling on all UK supermarkets to take a stand against the danger and terror inflicted on our animals and vulnerable people multiple times a year.
And no, silent or “no noise” fireworks don’t fix the problem . Even the Chairman of the British Fireworks Association, Steve Raper, has been quoted saying: “ You cannot have an absolutely quiet firework. The lifting charge on a firework for a shot tube is about 95 decibels, and that is just the cartridge being ejected into the air. ” Besides, it is not just the noise, but also the smell and the flashing lights that affect people and animals .
We know that in the past supermarket chains like Sainsbury's have refused to stock fireworks on their shelves at all, which is great. But we are calling on all major UK supermarkets to join together on this.
Aldi, Asda, Booths, Co-op, Iceland, Lidl, M&S, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Waitrose – please show us that you care about the wellbeing of our wildlife, our farmed animals and our family members. Don’t stock fireworks on your shelves this year, “silent” or otherwise. It could quite literally save lives.
Image: Mike Mozart, Flickr (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
The suffering of companion animals due to fireworks is undeniable, causing stress, distress and trauma from explosions, sometimes leading to them running away from home, having seizures and even dying from the terror , to the heartbreak of their families.
“ I had to say goodbye to my beautiful boy last night”, writes Sarah Frost about her 12 year-old rescue dog Derry, “He was literally scared to death by fireworks. He had a fit he was unable to recover from – please please people think of pets and wild animals before you go letting off fireworks in your back gardens. I am absolutely heartbroken .”
Tragedies like this are all too common, and entirely avoidable . Farmed animals are also terrorised , often running away in abject fear of the smoke and the noise. Wild animals, too, are petrified often having their habitats destroyed by bonfires and their air polluted by the harmful gas released from the explosives.
The article The Devastating Effects of Fireworks on Pets and Wildlife | The MIT Press Reader (https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-devastating-effects-of-fireworks-on-pets-and-wildlife/) by Dr Kendra Coulter, a leading expert on animals and work, animal protection policy, fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics and Member of the City of London’s Animal Welfare Advisory Committee, explains the precise risks of fireworks on wild and companion animals, in particular, in the bizarre tradition of celebrating with methods which are known to cause serious and sometimes fatal harm.
There are also grave concerns expressed on the effects of fireworks on people with autism, PTSD, other sensory-related neurodivergence, and new-born babies .
Moreover, fireworks have led to a significant increase in incidents related to personal injury , putting our NHS staff under undue pressure around the fireworks season, as well as causing damage to property and alarming levels of noise pollution . Every year, particularly although not exclusively around Bonfire Night, we witness numerous instances of firework-related accidents – as we saw last November in Dundee and around Glasgow where fireworks were used as weapons against police officers.
While Animal Concern works on our UK-wide campaign to ban the sale of fireworks to the general public - we are calling on all UK supermarkets to take a stand against the danger and terror inflicted on our animals and vulnerable people multiple times a year.
And no, silent or “no noise” fireworks don’t fix the problem . Even the Chairman of the British Fireworks Association, Steve Raper, has been quoted saying: “ You cannot have an absolutely quiet firework. The lifting charge on a firework for a shot tube is about 95 decibels, and that is just the cartridge being ejected into the air. ” Besides, it is not just the noise, but also the smell and the flashing lights that affect people and animals .
We know that in the past supermarket chains like Sainsbury's have refused to stock fireworks on their shelves at all, which is great. But we are calling on all major UK supermarkets to join together on this.
Aldi, Asda, Booths, Co-op, Iceland, Lidl, M&S, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Waitrose – please show us that you care about the wellbeing of our wildlife, our farmed animals and our family members. Don’t stock fireworks on your shelves this year, “silent” or otherwise. It could quite literally save lives.
Image: Mike Mozart, Flickr (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
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