On Oct. 22, Punggol restaurant House of Seafood found themselves in a bit of a pinch after receiving backlash for their live crab claw machines.

Members of the public have called the restaurant out for animal cruelty, as did the SPCA.

For S$5, customers were able to catch their own crab and send it to the kitchen.

To cook it for their dinner, if there was any doubt.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B3VyPCCn29S/

Spoke to media

In light of the backlash,  House of Seafood CEO Francis Ng spoke to the media.

In short, he said that the machine:

1) Encouraged children to release the crabs back into the ocean.

2) Was designed to ease the crab's pain.

Reviewing systems

The same message was reiterated in a Facebook post on the restaurant's page on Oct. 24.

Ng starts off by apologising to "animal caregivers" and said they did not intend to use animals as play things.

In fact, the company had wanted to educate the children in Punggol about marine life:

"We noticed a lot of children at The Punggol Settlement and we wanted to educate them (about marine life) and allow them to return these crabs into the ocean. We want to encourage them to release the crabs back into the ocean after catching them."

Ng also repeated that the machine took one month to design, so that it would not "harm or hurt" the crabs.

The tank was also cleaned every day.

However, the restaurant has decided to "temporarily (sic) stop the claw machine" in order to review their system.

Ng ends his message by apologising and thanking everyone for their feedback.

Top image via House of Seafood Facebook

 

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