Amazon must stop selling live lobsters, the West of England’s Dan Norris has demanded – and called on the company to meet him face to face after they ignored his letters pleading with them to end the inhumane trade.
The Mayor first wrote to Amazon on 4 January about the cruel practice and heard nothing. After a follow up in February and then again in March he was told “We are currently reviewing your inquiry of live lobster couriering and I will follow up with you as soon as I hear back from the relevant team”. He is still waiting for a substantive reply.
Metro Mayor Dan Norris said, “Amazon talk up their next day delivery but I’ve been waiting over four months for a response to my letter about lobster cruelty.”
While it would be unthinkable to order a live lamb or chicken on Amazon and wait for the delivery driver to drop it off alongside the books, clothes and electronics you have ordered – shockingly lobsters are treated exactly in this way.
One listing on the site today (9 May) reads “We guarantee that the product is live when dispatched and we cannot be held responsible for troubles during the delivery process.”
Long-standing animal welfare advocate Dan Norris said: “This cannot be right. People would be rightly up in arms if any other animal was treated this way – in fact I think they will be horrified about this too. Amazon needs to end this and end it now.
“There is no thought for their welfare. A difficult journey and then arriving at a house where amateurs smash in their skulls or boil them alive. I believe a measure of a country is how you treat animals and we can do better than this.”