KEY POINTS:
A senior SPCA official is calling on TVNZ to consider dumping a Jamie Oliver show in which he suffocates chicks in front of a studio audience.
TV One is planning to show Jamie's Fowl Dinners in a primetime slot after the Olympics.
In the one-off made for Britain's Channel 4, Oliver asks his guests to separate male and female chicks before putting the males into a "dispatching chamber" and suffocating them.
Later in the show, the chef electrocutes a live chicken and drains its blood from its mouth.
The deaths reduced some audience members to tears, but Oliver said he wanted to highlight the plight of factory-farmed chickens.
He told the Channel 4 website he "hated" killing the birds but it was "a job that needs to be done".
"I don't think it's sen-sational to show people the reality of how chickens live and die at the moment.
"It may be upsetting for somepeople, but that's how things are.
"All of those birds would have been killed anyway, as thousands are every day up and down the country [Britain]."
Bob Kerridge, Auckland SPCA chief executive, said the organisation supported Oliver's aim but the killings sounded "quite revolting".
He said the show was likely to upset people and TVNZ should reconsider screening it. "There are other ways of protesting against factory farming [rather] than public spectacle."
TVNZ said the show was likely to carry a warning, as did any other with content that might offend or disturb some viewers.
Animal Liberation Aotearoa member Jasmine Gray questioned Oliver's motives, calling the killings "inappropriate and completely unnecessary".
She hoped viewers would be influenced to buy free-range products but said there was a difference between people "seeing what happens, and him using it for ratings".
"He has gone about it the wrong way, and basically used those chickens as entertainment."
Hans Kriek, New Zealand campaign director for Save Animals From Experiments, congratulated Oliver's "brave stance". "What he is showing is reality, and, if anything, he's actually being quite conservative," Kriek said. "Yes, it's a shock tactic, but just that happens every day to millions of animals."
Poultry Industry Association executive director Michael Brooks said the show might not be relevant in New Zealand because it reflected British animal welfare standards.
Oliver told the Channel 4 website any controversy would be worth the fuss if just 5 per cent of viewers changed their shopping habits. British reports suggest sales of organic chooks and free-range eggs soared after the show aired there at the start of the year.
It's not the first time Oliver has taken a stand.
In 2005, he started a campaign to improve the quality of school dinners served in British schools. The following year parents at a school in South Yorkshire rebelled, when they said his food was "disgustingrubbish".
