BADGER CULL - Response from MP

Last week, after the decisions made by government to go ahead with the trial badger cull which is set to shoot 5,000 badgers (see blog - 'BADGER CULL GIVEN THE GO AHEAD'), I sent a letter to my local MP, Norman Baker, asking him to stand up against the cull. I thought that some of those who read this blog would be interested to see how he replied:

Dear Ms Jones

Thank you for contacting me recently concerning the selective cull of badgers, which the government has decided to authorise.

I looked into the issue of badger culling at great length when I was the Lib Dem shadow environment secretary before the last general election. The removal of badgers from TB hotspots is both a complicated and difficult issue. There is undoubtedly a serious problem with TB in both the English cattle and badger populations, which is getting worse. The proposed culls are designed to control bovine TB in a measured and targeted way and will apply in two specific areas where infection rates are high.

While I find the idea of a cull of badgers deeply distressing, I am afraid that choosing to do nothing about bovine TB at this time, given the current lack of a viable vaccine, is simply not a responsible option. Leaving things as they are for the time being can only increase the suffering caused by TB for cows, badgers and other wildlife vulnerable to the disease. Allowing TB to spread is not a good animal welfare policy for badgers themselves.

Bovine TB is one of the biggest challenges facing cattle farmers today. Around 28,000 cattle were slaughtered in England in 2012 as a bovine TB control measure, at a cost to the taxpayer of nearly £100million, rising to £500million over the past decade. As a political party with a long history of supporting animal welfare, Lib Dems would much prefer to vaccinate animals rather than cull badgers. I have worked as best I can in parliament to try and promote better cattle husbandry, pushing for greater bio security on farms and in cattle movement, in order to prevent the cross contamination. It is, however, inevitable that cattle allowed to graze outside in the natural environment, as they should be, will encounter wildlife that may be carrying harmful diseases.

Over the years various governments have tried to develop an effective badger vaccine and I personally pressed the previous government to develop a TB vaccine for cattle. £43million in total has been spent since 1994 on developing an oral bovine TB vaccine for badgers as well as cattle vaccine. I am pleased that the coalition has at least committed to investing a further £15.5million in vaccine development over the next four years.

We are told, however, that a viable cattle vaccine is at least 10 years away and current badger vaccination programmes have been shown to have an efficacy rate of only around 70% in those badgers that receive the vaccine. I am both frustrated and disappointed that so little progress has been made and, in light of the current increased pressure on this matter, I have now written to David Heath asking why it is taking so long and what can be done to reduce this 10 year period. I will inform you of the reply I receive in due course.

In the meantime I am absolutely clear that what will now take place in the South West over the summer is merely a trial cull. Any decision to extend the culling programme to other parts of the country would be dependent on an analysis of the two pilot culls.

I hope this is helpful.

Yours sincerely

Norman Baker MP

I am both pleased and upset by this response. I am pleased that Baker is pushing to get better vaccines worked on, and that he obviously has been a greater part of the debate... But at the same time seems to think that culling badgers is actually going to do something. Where he states that vaccinations "have an efficacy rate of only around 70%" I ask what the efficacy of culling is? Infected badgers will be pushed out in fear and further spread the disease. Surely 70% of cured badgers is better than 5,000 dead ones? I am also worried as to his response that "what will now take place in the South West over the summer is merely a trial cull" ... it seems such a light way of putting that 5,000 animals are going to be shot, and many more severely distressed. 

I really hope that those that keep pressurising the government, and the petition that has now been signed by over 250,000 people will do something to make a change to this ridiculous decision... but I sincerely doubt it. When do they ever listen?