Tönnies Scandal in Court

Undercover investigations reveal rent gouging, intimidation, and exploitation within the system of meat billionaire Clemens Tönnies.

Germany's largest slaughterhouse stands out like few other operations for its appalling wage and living conditions.

On 14 December 2021, the SAT1 programme «Inside Tönnies» was broadcast, exposing shocking abuses at the Tönnies slaughterhouse that continue to this day.

PETA has been demanding transparency for years

The large-scale operation has always been intent on keeping everything out of public view: Seven and a half years ago, PETA Senior Adviser Dr. Edmund Haferbeck submitted a request for information to the Gütersloh district authority. At the time, Dr. Haferbeck requested documents relating to disposal statistics, any pending court or regulatory proceedings, failed stunning practices, and possible legal violations. The district authority agreed to release the information under the state press and consumer protection act, but was stopped at the last moment by Tönnies.

The lawsuit subsequently filed before the Minden Administrative Court was successful: In a ruling dated 28 July 2016, the court ordered the Gütersloh district — backed by intervening party Tönnies — to release the information. The legal remedies filed since then have been delaying the proceedings for five years now.

The company Tönnies, as can be inferred from its legal game of hide-and-seek, evidently has much to conceal that goes beyond the already cruel CO2 stunning of pigs practised there as standard.

«Through ever new tricks and half-truths in its legal submissions to the North Rhine-Westphalian Higher Administrative Court, the Tönnies clan manages time and again to prevent the implementation of the Minden Administrative Court ruling», says Dr. Edmund Haferbeck, Senior Adviser in Special Projects at PETA.

«The legal “defensive battle” is being waged more by Tönnies as an intervening party than by the Gütersloh district, which is actually the defendant. This is just one more of the many scandals surrounding the mass slaughterhouse operation.Animal cruelty and slave-like working conditions are part of the system there, as in the meat industry as a whole.»

Overwhelming feedback on the reportage

«Thank you SAT.1 for airing this report about the Tönnies slaughter factory», says interpreter Viktor by phone. «I could tell you far worse stories, but I don’t dare.» The day after the broadcast of the “SAT.1 investigativ” report on the Tönnies system, countless former workers, people from their circle, and even lawyers get in touch alongside Viktor (name changed), all wanting to share their stories about the meat giant from Rheda-Wiedenbrück. They all have one thing in common: they are afraid of the Tönnies system — and wish to remain anonymous.

SAT.1 editor-in-chief Juliane Essling: «As a journalist, I have rarely experienced such feedback on a report. It is hard to imagine how intimidated the people are who contact us. We will examine every single case and then decide how to tell a second part of the report.»