I have previously written about the appalling Badger cull here and here.
On Wednesday of this week, the Government announced that no new mass culls of Badgers will be allowed in England after 2022.
The drive to eradicate bovine TB (bTB) will instead focus on vaccinating Badgers and cattle and tightening restrictions on the movement of cattle. The Environment Secretary, George Eustice, stated progress was being made on a cattle vaccine and it could be available from 2025. He also said that limited Badger culling may be allowed after that in “exceptional circumstances to address any local disease flare-ups”. The Government has invited responses to its consultation on a future strategy on controlling bTB in England.
However, we have been here before with a so-called Government commitment to cease the culling of Badgers.
The independent Godfray review in February 2018 found that the frequent trading of cattle and poor biosecurity on farms was severely hampering efforts to tackle bTB and said it was wrong to blame Badgers as the main cause of the outbreaks. It said it was “highly desirable” to move from culling to vaccination of Badgers.
In March 2020, arising from the Godfray Review, the Government announced that it would commit to non-lethal control of Badgers, phase out culling of Badgers and move towards bTB vaccination in both Badgers and cattle.
Nonetheless, in September 2020, the Government confirmed a huge expansion of the Badger cull to 11 new areas. It went back on its stated commitments and allowed for the issue of licences for the shooting of Badgers in 54 areas in over 28,000 square kilometres of England stretching from Cornwall to Cumbria.
With the latest Government announcement and consultation, the Badger Trust has urged extreme caution over the “mixed messages” in the statement. It is not confident that the Government’s statement signals the end of the Badger cull as reported and neither does it mark the end of blame being placed primarily with Badgers for the ongoing bTB crisis in cattle.
The Badger Trust also noted that on the same day as the Government’s statement, figures on Badgers killed in the 2020 cull were released which added a further 38,642 Badgers to the already horrific total of 102,349 killed since the start of the current cull in 2013. A further 60,000 plus Badgers are expected to be culled in the next 2 years.
This questions the Government’s motivations in releasing very conflicting messages on the same day, with the perceived, yet very questionable, “good news” ahead of the “very bad news”.
Badgers are continuing to pay the ultimate price for a flawed policy based on highly controversial science and when other non-lethal solutions to bTB are available.
The announcement of the 2020 cull figures came shortly after the widely publicised announcement of a new consultation into the Government’s policy to eradicate bTB, the supposed reason for the Badger cull. This was picked up as a “good news” story and reported as a possible “end in sight” message for the cull. The cull figures were then released to little fanfare.
Dawn Varley, acting CEO at the Badger Trust, commented: “The reality of the Badger cull is in that stark number – 38,642 badgers killed – an increase of over 10% on 2019’s figures, and 140,991 deaths overall since this policy was adopted in 2013. And the total will continue to rise, likely going beyond 200,000 by the end of 2022, with a further 2 years already locked into current expansion plans and 4 year licences still to run. The culling policy is inhumane and unnecessary at best, and at worst it’s a smokescreen and ineffective strategy to appease farmers”.
She continued: “We fundamentally challenge the need to kill Badgers, when the science consistently fails to pinpoint them as the major cause of transmission of this terrible disease in cattle. Instead of the new consultation, the Government would do well to put time and effort into bringing a cattle vaccine to market, hopefully once and for all dealing with this terrible problem for animals and farmers alike.”
Stop the cull!
No comments:
Post a Comment
If you feel like commenting on my blog, you can contact me by completing the comment form below. I will respond to all comments and enquiries and constructive criticism will always be welcomed.