Happy Egg hens all come from UK hatcheries, the company’s owner has said

This article is subject to a legal complaint from Happy Egg.

Happy Egg, Britain’s leading “high-welfare” egg brand, faces accusations of cruelty as The Sunday Times reveals that in their first day of life the hens it uses were suspended by their necks in a machine that burnt off the tips of their beaks.

A video shot secretly in a ­German hatchery supplying free-range and organic breeds of hens shows a process similar to that used by hatcheries supplying Happy Egg with the chicks from which its “free range” hens are reared. Happy Egg’s owner, Noble Foods, admits it uses chicks from this hatchery for its other brands but says its Happy Egg hens all come from UK hatcheries.

“We filmed day-old female chicks being