MADAM – Reply to J Tuck. In the latest “hot news” concerning this incredibly silly farcical debate, the Badger Trust have lost their court cases trying to stop badger culls.

Afraid it is schadenfreude but I was in fact delighted.

I warned them months ago that a legal challenge would be a crass idea and waste of scarce “charity” monies.

There is no earthly reason why continuing pilot culls should need any IEP Independent Expert Panel scrutiny.

They’re aimed at a pragmatic practical way allegedly to stop the spread of TB, which is daft since spread is via “missed” cattle TB carrier cases anyway.

Rather naive to imagine the IEP were truly supposed to monitor the science, since they did not even check whether badgers culled had TB.

Clearly typical political pawn appointees, carefully chosen as “experts” who wouldn’t rock the boat but endorse the “scientific credibility of the whole crazy idea” (Lord Krebs).

Three Law Lords rejected the appeal, as did the original challenge a few months ago, in the High Court and imposed a fine of c £10,000 costs.

I told you so too.

At least five years ago I warned Dr Brian May and Team Badger that they would not stop culls by telling everyone that perturbed badgers are a major problem, so a vaccine the answer.

Farmer joy– since badgers are still a major problem cull more even more widely.

And already calls for three extra pilots next year, in part to diffuse the costly protestors’ disruptions (£2 million in extra policing last year).

Indeed, the NFU’s Minette Batters happily claims the court ruling proves culls are necessary.

Whilst John Tuck’s recent response claims culls work.

If Team Badger genuinely want to see an end to utterly mindless, pointless badger culls they should be shouting from the rooftops that badgers are emphatically not the cause of the spread of TB.

Indeed they should very publicly stop backing any further meaningless badger vaccine work, thereby urging a realisation of the simple truth that badgers cannot possibly be even a minor cause of cattle TB spread.

In 40 years no-one has shown how badgers are realistically supposed to give cows a respiratory lung broncho-pneumonia.

And the CSL/FERA Woodchester study of a high risk endemic badger TB population has not produced even a single case of badgers causing a single herd breakdown since 1975.

Well, sorry repeating this tired old “badger culls work” story does not make it true.

The Thornbury, Avon and Steeple Leaze, Dorset culls often cited, actually happened just when cattle controls had cleared the areas of cattle TB, so the gassing was totally irrelevant. The Thornbury study had a brief flare up of 16 TB herds in 104 sq.km, and clearing the area of badgers did not stop one-two so-called unconfirmed “badger-related” herd breakdowns each year until the early 1990s when confirmed breakdowns happened after mad cow re-stocking.

(The actual spread of TB by such early TB reactor cows, without visible lung lesions accounts for the more than 95 per cent of unconfirmed herd breakdowns supposedly caused by badgers).

Steeple Leaze was merely a cluster of six chronic herds, cured by taking out over 300 reactors, c. 1/3 with lesions.

Nowadays the answer would be to use as in Ireland a quick late TB enfer antibody blood test to pick up any active spreader skin test non-reactors (see badgersandtb.com).

This is what the likes of Brian Barton, Adam Quinney, Jan Rowe, Adam Henson and Meurig Raymond should be doing.

And lastly, although the ISG’s scientific “experts” conclusion was that their £50 million Krebs/RBCT cull of 11,000 badgers, reduced cattle TB by 50 per cent, but also via perturbed badgers increased it by 25 per cent, these daft claims merely show they haven’t a clue how TB works in either cows or badgers.

How on earth are badgers emigrating into vacuum cull areas supposed to cause a cattle TB rise in the outside 2km ring?

In truth, the actual end result of the cull showed almost nil difference between accumulated herd breakdowns in cull versus no cull areas, 1562 versus 1668 breakdowns (ie. a mere 10/300 sq.km triplet).

A 50 per cent drop should have been 834 vs 1668, and a perturbation rise 2029 vs 1668.

The ISG unbelievably accepted the 50 per cent drop “due to badger culls” in a re-analysis of the Irish East Offaly and Four Areas culls, but in fact the cattle control decreases there had absolutely nothing to do with the cull of a mere 141 and 286 TB badgers from 600 and 960 sq km respectively: pink spectacles “seeing what you want to believe”.

What a waste of time, money, and badgers all to achieve absolutely nothing in tackling cattle TB.

Martin Hancox

ex-government Badger TB Panel Stroud