Shouldn’t we be testing badgers?

Many years ago I was chairman of a dairy industry trade body’s farming section. I’m not good at putting dates and events together, but I think it was during the last term of the Blair government.

One day, we had a nice lady come to speak to us, who was, I think at the time, “number three“ at Defra. As it was all farmers there, TB was the main topic (nothing new there). I told the minister our annual test was due the following week and, as she knew, if any animals had TB, they would be removed for slaughter. I also told her I lived in a very wooded area and I knew a lot of badgers were in those woods.

I said: “What is the point, if my supposedly clean cattle, which have just been tested, are grazing at night among badgers that might have TB? Why not catch a few badgers at the same time and test them? If they were clear I would have no problem, but if they had TB they should be euthanised painlessly in their sett. As things are now, if my badgers did have TB there would never be an end game for my cattle and TB would be a problem forever.”

The minister was honest enough to say my point was well made, that it had an undeniable logic to it and she would take it up with her civil servants. I knew the point was well made; I’d been practising it on the train. However, as for the civil servants with her, they had consternation written all over their faces, while shuffling their papers vigorously.

I might have told this story before, but it is an important point and, despite the intervening years, that is exactly my position today. All I want is healthy cattle and healthy badgers – it seems an altogether reasonable position to take. The minister clearly thought it was reasonable (for how long had to be another matter; I imagine her advisors gave her a tough time in the taxi). That is one of the reasons I find the views of the anti-badger cull groups frustrating. Although I have concerns about the impact badgers have on the breeding of ground-nesting birds, and on leveret and hedgehogs, the far greater concern has to be their role in the spread of TB. We can argue (and some do) they have a 50% impact, but even if it is less than 10%, that is a percentage that cannot be ignored if we are, eventually, to be clear of the problem.

Heads in the sand

While I take the more pragmatic position healthy cows and healthy badgers can coexist, many anti-cull lobbyists appear to show no regard for the welfare of cattle. They don’t seem a bit concerned cattle are being culled in their thousands. It is a sort of “heads in the sand” attitude that defies belief. If people take views like that – views that defy belief, are so opposite to your own you cannot believe it and are in such denial – it is usually for a reason. It doesn’t take long to guess the reason; one thing anti-cull groups can’t resist is publicity for their cause.

Many espouse their cause with the sort of religious zeal that motivated bold young men to get on white horses and go on the Crusades. The reason anti-cull groups don’t appear to be worried about the thousands of cattle culled annually is that, in the background, they have a bigger picture than badgers.

Many opponents come from a vegan/vegetarian point of view. They are not too concerned about the continuing loss of cattle because, in their perfect world, there wouldn’t be any cattle anyway. The giveaway is the endless letters they send to the local press, in particular. They purport to come from individuals and represent a body of growing opinion, but because so many of these letters are sent, there is a commonality to them.

They invariably use the same bullet points, they might put them in a different order to infer some originality, but somewhere in the letter a form of words or phrases is often used they like, which resonates with them, and they all can’t resist using them. This is a phenomena I became aware of in the years that followed the breaking up of the Milk Marketing Board. It was a divisive time in our industry and endless letters were published in the press. I would read a letter one week and a different letter the next, but one would ring a bell with the other, and I would say to myself, “I know who you’ve been talking to”.

It is interesting to see how these letters have evolved over the years. Two years ago, they didn’t accept that badgers, in particular, and wildlife, in general, played any part in the spread of bovine TB – it was all down to poor biosecurity on farms and irresponsible cattle movement. Last year, the letters were all about vaccination being the weapon of choice.

If vaccination were to work it would have its attractions; it is non-violent and should appeal to the views of the general public whose support they seek to enlist. However, they made great play of the vaccination policy in Wales and hailed it as a resounding success. I try quite hard to let these letters pass me by, to go over my head, but indignation can be a great motivator, and I wrote a letter. In it I said vaccination was not a success in Wales and the letters were irresponsible to say so, and, moreover, no vaccinations had been done in Wales for more than 12 months.

That stopped the letters and I pictured the writers “licking their wounds”. I knew full well the reason no vaccinations had been done was because of a vaccine shortage. In this war of words, however, I didn’t feel it incumbent on me to supply these people with facts. They should do their own research.

This year, free badger vaccinations are being offered and it is said 40 badgers have been done in the country already. Shropshire is the largest landlocked county in England; I don’t know how many badgers are in the county (and I am very sceptical of anyone who says they do), but I would be very surprised if fewer than 40 were on my fields at night. To go around with lamps is the only way to find out and I have no intention of doing that.

A bit of me longs to write a letter saying 40 badgers is such a small percentage, it is meaningless. Thus far, I have resisted. The only problem I’ve got is, to a reader of the letter who doesn’t know much about it, 40 might be considered a number that makes a real difference – but it doesn’t.