Episode 3 The Chicken People

In the UK, each and every day,

we eat more than 2 million chickens.

One in three comes from a single company in Northern Ireland.

Good afternoon, Moy Park?

That's nearly 10,000 tonnes a week of fillets, nuggets,

drumsticks and Kievs.

We get through probably 8,000 or 9,000 cases.

Multiplied by 16, which is...

Whatever that is!

From farm to fork, it's a business worth billions.

It costs 350,000.

Yeah, a nice little house in the South of France

would have been a lot more useful, I think!

This massive operation takes a small army of farmers,

factory workers, technicians and tasters.

It's southern fried.

-Southern fried's lovely!

-SHE LAUGHS

Meet the chicken people!

Moy Park is officially Northern Ireland's largest private company.

As well as the hundreds of farmers and factory workers,

its workforce is a surprisingly mixed bag.

We employ over 12,000 people.

That's across our 14 facilities

in Northern Ireland, Ireland, England, Holland and France.

We've got scientists, data analysts.

We've got chefs.

We've got drivers, we've got planners.

I mean, every skill that you can imagine,

Moy Park uses within its business.

We actually can't get enough great people,

in that the business is moving so fast,

this time next year there will be more skills

that we probably don't know that we need.

When it comes to dealing with incoming calls,

it's people skills that count.

Something that receptionist Joan honed to perfection

when she worked at the hatchery in Craigavon.

I worked in the office, but I also did relief on the switchboard there.

And it was one of the real old-time switchboards.

You know, great big, tall switchboard

with all these pegs that you pushed in and out.

And if anybody annoyed you,

you could push the plug in real hard and crack the ears off them.

It's 7.30 on the morning of the Balmoral Show.

And at the Moy Park stand,

the executive chefs are about to prepare 300 breakfasts.

Which means they need 300 clean plates.

Julia done them all last year.

She told me she done all of the dishes last year.

-That right?

-Yep.

By myself. Completely.

Before the cooking starts in earnest, Aaron tries out a prototype.

Nice. That's just a cold version that we've done.

Just purely a dry run.

It's just too sort of see how it looks.

It's pretty on the plate, so, yeah.

It's actually come together well.

Everything looks good to go.

Now, all the breakfast needs is a name.

Chef's Menu? Chef's Special Menu?

Chef's Menu Balmoral 2015?

Something like that?

-Jeez, it's not flowing. Seriously.

-No, it's not happening today at all.

We really should have thought this yesterday, shouldn't we?

Clucking Big Breakfast!

All right, Clucking Big Breakfast.

THEY LAUGH

Or, just put, "Chicken And Egg".

Yeah?

-What came first?

-What came first!

-So, Chicken And Egg?

-Yeah.

Or, "What Came First?"

Chicken And Egg Superfood Breakfast. Yeah?

Make up your minds!

THE LAUGH

So, the snappily titled,

What Came First? Chicken And Egg Chef's Superfood Clucking Big Breakfast is born.

Catchy.

At the Hobson's farm,

Jeremy is checking on his latest crop of chickens,

which arrived last week fresh from the hatchery.

This batch is exactly seven days old.

Basically, the birds are pushed in on trolleys

and you set them out on the floor.

And you have to be fairly quick

because the birds start to follow you right away.

If I went in there to put out 23,000 birds by myself,

they'd be all around me.

I'd get trapped in the house.

So, you have to be very quick.

Right...

Did you know that the official name for a fear of chickens

is alektorophobia?

Still, if the worst ever does happen, Jeremy can always rely

on his wife, Caroline, for some unconditional support.

Here, do you want a cup of tea?

Yes, please.

Will you pay me?

SHE LAUGHS

I've been farming here since I left school at 16.

-Which is basically 30-odd years ago.

-75 years ago!

Jeremy was my boyfriend when he was a smelly pig farmer

way back when he was about 18.

And then I went off to London and we both did our own thing.

Then, when I came back home again, seven, eight years ago,

we bumped into each other and found that we were both free and single.

Not young, but free and single anyway.

And we got together again.

It was just... Yeah, it was sort of meant to be in a... In a...

Roundabout way.

Romantic sort of a way!

I didn't even have a cat when I was in London.

So, no, this is absolutely fantastic. It's a lovely change.

They all expect us to put one of these poor pigs on a spit at some stage,

but they're only here for part of the family.

You don't eat your family.

'Farming gives you freedom.

'I mean, there is a lot of... Of worries, and things that are out of your control,'

but it certainly is a lovely, free way of life.

-Isn't it?

-Don't paint it too good.

-Oh, no, it's very hard.

I have seven houses, and every house is looking good so far.

But it only takes one mistake one day.

You're working on that fine limit now.

Over the last year, Jeremy has invested heavily

in a renewable biomass heating system for his chickens.

The biomass heating has left my life an awful lot easier.

And the quality of chicken coming off the farm is an awful lot better.

Biomass is cheaper to run

and produces less moisture than the previous gas heating.

For the chickens, that means cleaner air, dry litter,

and a drastic reduction in a condition called hock burn.

Hock burn's where they sit down on their knee,

and this here would get burned on the litter if the litter's bad.

And, basically, with the biomass heating system

it's dry in the air all the time which in turn dries the litter.

It's far better for the chickens and it's far better for me.

Jeremy might be happy,

but the sheer cost of the upgrade has gone down less well at home.

It cost 350,000 to do the seven chicken houses.

It's unbelievable.

It can never be good enough.

They never seem to have enough. I think it's incredible actually.

You could have done without it,

but you just strive to put in that extra bit if you think

it's going to enhance your farm, grow your chickens better.

Yeah, a nice little house in the South of France

would have been a lot more useful, I think!

Back at Moy Park's Dungannon plant,

it's all in a day's work for receptionist Joan.

Good afternoon, Moy Park?

The chicken that sits on my desk is a stress reliever.

You'll notice mine's in good condition

because I don't really get stressed.

I can't say the same for the rest of the chickens about here.

Some of them have no heads on them.

One man who could probably use a stress-relieving chicken

is Dungannon production manager Jim Trotter.

I try to come in in a positive attitude every day.

Some days that lasts all day,

other days it lasts two minutes.

But you try to be positive.

It's Jim's job to keep the production lines constantly in motion

to process around 20,000 chickens every hour.

This line will not stop at all today.

Or tonight. It'll be running up until 2.15 tonight.

Big orders, it's all hands to the pump.

You just have to keep it pushed.

All right?

Sometimes, though, despite Jim's best efforts,

things still have a habit of grinding to a halt.

We're having a mechanical problem with one of our ceiling heads.

So we're having to remove that head and put another one in.

How long's it been down for?

That's been playing up since we put that head in this morning at 6.30.

There's big pressure to make sure we deliver to the customer

what they want, when they want it.

You have to react. You can't say, "I'll look at that tomorrow."

It has to be done today.

Has to be done straightaway. A decision has to be made.

This time Jim's decision is to call in the experts.

Dungannon's crack team of maintenance engineers is always on hand,

ready to spring into action at a moment's notice.

If the fault can't be fixed quickly,

it could have serious consequences for the day's production.

Give her a wee shove out there, you're all right.

While the machine is out of action

trays of food from Jim's production lines

are beginning to stack up.

You're sitting here with 170 people on the floor,

you're trying to make sure that they aren't losing.

Five minutes doesn't sound like a lot, but over 170, it is a lot.

And that can be a lot of production

that will put us under pressure later on in the evenings.

Every second counts.

Production is off, people standing in the line doing nothing,

so we're under pressure to get the product out all the time.

Yep, all the time.

After a few precious minutes, the machine is repaired,

the line is back in business, and Jim is smiling again.

There's a line I like to see, full.

If this is full, we are making some money, so we are.

By mid morning, the Balmoral show is also up and running.

The crowds are pouring in. The sun is shining. And the stalls are buzzing.

Well...most of them.

Slow.

We've had no customers,

I'm just going to have to close the restaurant down.

In fact... Ladies, can you go and drum up some trade out there?

There's bound to be some passers-by.

We're getting to the stage, just invite anybody in.

It's early days. Early days, so... It'll kick off soon.

The eggs are perfect.

The eggs are perfect, yes, Martin done all of them yesterday,

so don't talk about his eggs, he gets very precious.

It will kick off. It will kick off shortly.

At certain farms like this one, belonging to Sinton Kerr,

the birds are treated to the very best food and drink,

their own private gardens, and top class accommodation.

These are no ordinary birds.

These are the Rolls-Royce of poultry.

Organic chickens.

An organic farm is one where there are no artificial sprays,

or additives, or fertiliser,

or anything brought onto the farm or in contact with the chickens.

Which means they are as true to nature as you can get.

Sinton's hens enjoy more room and organic food.

They live longer than any other table bird, and most importantly,

they get to experience the great outdoors.

The first few days they sort of stand and look out,

take stock of what is happening,

then as the time goes on, they just love to get out.

You can see them picking and poking,

I don't know what they 're poking for,

but that's their natural environment, to be outdoors,

foraging, or ranging, as we call it.

Another little luxury that regular broiler hens can only dream of is,

believe it or not, trees.

I mean, the chickens obviously do like cover.

These trees provide them with some sort of shade from the sun,

from the wind, from the rain, which they can shelter under.

Basically, I suppose, the chickens,

it's bred into them to be cautious of predators,

there's buzzards roundabout here

and occasionally they come and fly over and call.

Whatever message they send to these birds,

you see them flighting off, back to the house.

As I have said many a time, if I wanted to come back as a chicken,

I would certainly want to be a free-range chicken.

I think it's a fairly good life.

Me and the chickens get along pretty well.

At Moy Park's Craigavon plant it is Health & Well-Being Week.

Promoting all aspects of fitness, both physical and spiritual.

A little bit of time away from the desk.

No e-mails, and no phone. It's very welcome.

This is a tough business at times.

You know, we work long hours.

You know, it is challenging.

And one of the things we are particularly keen on is to ensure

that our employees have awareness of their own health.

So during the well-being week there will be certain initiatives

whereby we will encourage them to look at their health,

their exercise, their nutrition.

And I think just, you know, helping them to stand back

and look at what they are doing,

and that they are taking care of themselves.

-You're maybe talking about two stone.

-Yes. At least! Three stone!

-Hold on till I give you this wee sheet!

-Two stone!

But in Craigavon's packing area, supervisors, Carla and Maria,

have to decide how to proceed when one worker does come to them

saying he is too ill to work.

He says he is feeling dizzy.

So first aid is having a look with him

and just seeing what is the problem.

And if he doesn't improve in five or ten minutes,

we have to send him home.

In Moy Park if they say we're sick, we have to try our best. Yes?

-Are you OK to go alone? Don't drive. Are you driving?

-Are you driving?

-No, I'm getting a taxi.

-Please. Call a cab. OK? All the best.

So, we'll take Carlos to cover him.

We are not doctors. So who am I to say, "You're not sick"?

Because one day I could say, "No, you don't go home."

And then, passed away on the floor, or collapse,

and then, I'm in trouble.

For Carla, this is all a far cry

from the line of work she had back in her home country of Portugal.

Before I started this job here, 12 years ago, I started a career,

as I would like to call it, singing.

David, why has the line stopped, do you know?

People would ring me and ask me,

"Would you mind singing a song for us?"

I went to Portuguese TV shows and everything, and I won a few.

I couldn't just stay with that job,

because I would be sitting in the house waiting for phone calls.

And I had a mortgage to pay, and other things to pay.

Until me and my partner decided to go somewhere else.

So this is Roger. He is a machine minder. But he is also my partner.

How is our A-bar performing today?

-Better than yesterday.

-Better than yesterday? OK.

-Would you like to start that?

-OK, I'll start the belt for you.

I'd better go before he kills me!

Today is Maria's last day at work for some time,

for reasons that are becoming increasingly obvious.

-Maria is about to...

-Having my baby!

Maria, like Carla, is originally from Portugal,

but moved here when jobs became scarce at home.

I'm very proud to be a manager in Moy Park,

because we don't have a job at home.

All of my family is at home. I miss home.

Yes. It is hard.

-SHE SOBS

-Oh, my God.

Calm down!

Maria and Carla are among a high number of workers from outside the UK

for whom Moy Park is a vital source of income.

I actually was here whenever we had

the sort of first influx of foreign nationals working with us.

They want to do well. They want to work hard.

I believe in their countries it' s hard to make a living

and it's hard to get a good wage packet at the end of the day.

I have met people from parts of the world I didn't even know existed.

We have people here from Poland, Lithuania, Russia, Romania,

we have people from Turkey, people from East Timor,

some fantastic people, I've made some very good friends

I'd never have met, only at Moy Park.

Hello, how are you? Are you all right?

Best friend. Carmen, Maria here, the line here is all friends.

Three of four times a year,

different groups of people will all be going out.

You will have line 5 all heading off together.

And that's seven or eight different nationalities.

They'll all go out for a meal.

Have a night's craic and then talk about it for a week

whenever they return.

We are like family. We work, we joke, play, everybody happy.

You're looking busy.

-You're looking...

-Argh!

We wouldn't have a business without them people

because we didn't have the labour available to us

within the country to come and make this business what it needed to be.

And without the foreign nationals coming

we wouldn't have the business we have.

Back at Balmoral, it's almost midday

and Aaron is still pitching hard to give away his first breakfast.

Are you going to have breakfast with us?

What comes first, the chicken or the egg? It's a super food breakfast.

-Yes.

-So, see this, actually?

So it's our Moy Park chicken

and some super food elements around it.

So we've got some avocado, cherry tomato compote,

granola, topped with a poached egg.

-You want to sit down and have some?

-Why not!

-How many of you is there?

-There's just two of us.

-Right, we'll do two.

Success.

But after such a slow start to the day,

Aaron could really use some positive feedback.

The pressure we're under here, I just...

And the verdict?

-Absolutely beautiful.

-First class.

A combination of chicken for breakfast

is something you wouldn't think of,

but that tied in with the poached eggs, it's perfect.

Soon the chef's chickens are flying off the shelves.

All the plates are coming back empty,

which is a good sign, isn't it?

Much to Aaron's relief.

Yeah, it seems to be getting the thumbs up.

What's not to like?

That was breakfast done.

Think we done about 100 there. So really pleased that went.

The feedback has been really good.

We're going to move across to lunch now.

Today the Scullion family is getting ready to say goodbye

to the breeding birds they have had for more than a year now.

We are at the end of the crop,

it will be four weeks now,

until we get a new crop, which we have to wash and disinfect,

and get ready for the next crop coming in.

Yeah. There you are.

-Who's the fella?

-Smile, you're on camera, Dad!

I only smile when I'm getting money!

The first job is to lift the feeders out of the way

to make room for the contractors who actually remove the birds.

That's all high enough there, that,

so if anybody...hits their head on that there...

..they are too big!

To avoid stressing the chickens, the contractors close the doors

and work in the dark, wearing red head torches.

In there it's very dusty, very warm.

We used to do that years ago.

We used to have to catch our own hens.

Thank God for somebody else.

Those breeder hens will be sold on

for people to process into soup, or pies.

That meat would be a little bit tougher

because the bird is that bit older.

But where people are putting them into pies

they will want a firmer structure of meat,

and so there's a really good market for that.

And with the chickens on their way out,

there's time to reflect on a year's worth of hard graft.

The public don't understand how much work is involved in the henhouse.

It's just not what people assume it to be.

There's more to just the chicken being on the shelf.

Like, it's to get it to there.

The hen has to lay the egg, the egg has to be fertilised,

the egg has to go to hatchery,

the chick is to be then kept alive the first day

and then transferred to a new house.

It has to be fed...

..and then it has to be transferred then to processing.

And then it's ready for packaging.

And then it's onto a shelf, like.

This is serious, serious work to put into it.

Of a total of more than 12,000 employees,

around half work in Moy Park's Northern Ireland factories.

It may not be everyone's cup of tea

but for some it can lead to a long and successful career.

I actually started off working in Moy Park as a student,

before I had finished my degree, and I worked in the giblet line.

And if anybody has worked in a chicken factory,

the giblet line is not the most sexy of environments.

And I remember going home that night to my mother and father,

saying, "You know what?

"I will never work in the chicken industry

"when I graduate from Queen's."

No, I've never worked in the factory. I don't think I could.

I don't suit a hairnet, or wellingtons. I'm too vain!

I used to work in the Ballymena factory

and I interviewed a young lad,

he had been a jockey.

Very nice lad. Seemed very intelligent.

So we brought him down to start on the Monday morning.

15 minutes later he went back, he said,

"I can't work here, this is like prison."

Yesterday we packed out 6,504.

Which was on target. Which was a green.

On our giveaway, it was 0.69, which was on target, was a green.

I was a cook before I came here.

And I was very much used to moving about a lot, you know,

from one end of the kitchen to another.

And when I came here

and I had to stand in one spot for eight hours a day,

the first two months there was definitely a couple of times

I may have been in the toilet, crying, thinking,

"What am I doing here?"

It isn't the environment for everyone.

Some people don't like touching meat.

You know, so, it's not for everyone,

but most people that come here stay.

I am not going to say everyone is ecstatic and skips into work,

but we don't have a big turnover of people.

As if to prove the point,

tonight is a very special date in the Moy Park calendar.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Armagh City Hotel.

Welcome, everybody.

The Long Service Awards are Moy Park's way of celebrating

those employees who have reached a landmark year in their careers.

OK, welcome to the Armagh City Hotel for the Long Service Awards.

In a few moments I'm going to hand over to Janet McCollum,

our chief executive, to have some opening remarks.

This presentation is for people that have been here 25 years,

and myself and a few others, 40 years.

I work in the hatchery.

There 40 years, so there must be something about it.

I started in Moy Park 43 years ago.

I will be here 27 years coming in March.

I started at Moy Park in 1988.

I started at Moy Park, I think it was 1979.

No, 1989. I'm not that old.

In total, here this evening,

we have almost 1,000 years of service to Moy Park.

I have given 27 years of my life to chicken

because I haven't been able to escape.

It gets into your blood. And once it gets into your blood,

I have to say, it's very difficult to escape.

I arrived at Moy Park 10 years ago, I've never looked back.

It's probably the most enjoyable job I have ever done.

-Thank you very much.

-See you.

-Goodbye.

I wouldn't work anywhere else, to be honest with you,

unless you're paying me £50,000 a year!

It's a local company, more or less run by local people, and, I mean,

if it wasn't for Moy Park,

certainly, I wouldn't be in chicken production.

Rain or sleet, you're in here, you're nice and warm.

You couldn't go wrong with it, like, you know?

I mean, I will be 50 this year,

and it's probably the best time I have had in my life.

People probably look at me like the chicken man,

I probably still haven't accepted being the chicken man,

but after 27 years I guess I am.