Bovine Tuberculosis (bTB) was a major problem in cattle herds earlier this century but was virtually eradicated by tuberculin testing and slaughter of infected cattle. However, bTB has persisted in southwest England, its traditional stronghold, some parts of Wales and the West Midlands, and is now increasing in other parts of Britain. Since the mid-1970s tens of thousands of badgers have been culled in response to bTB outbreaks because of circumstantial evidence that badgers spread the disease. However bTB has continued to increase in cattle. Bovine TB can be a serious problem for those farmers whose herds are affected. However it is still a relatively rare disease in the UK. To put bTB into context, in 2002 19,792 bTB reactors (cattle that gave a positive tuberculin skin test result) were slaughtered, which compares to 4,189,000 animals (including 590,000 cattle) slaughtered during the FMD outbreak¹. In addition, 90,000 cattle are culled annually due to mastitis, 31,000 due to lameness and 125,000 due to infertility².

In November 1996, the government commissioned a review, chaired by Professor John Krebs, to investigate links between bTB in cattle and badgers. The final report was published on 16 December 1997. It stated that “the sum of evidence strongly supports the view that, in Britain, badgers are a significant source of infection in cattle, although evidence is all indirect” and principally recommended that the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries (now the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA)) should set up an experiment to quantify the impact of culling badgers³. In February 1998 the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB (ISG) was set up by the Government, chaired by Professor John Bourne, to advise on implementation of the recommendations in the Krebs Report, specifically the badger culling trials. On 17 August 1998 the Government published the Bourne Report⁴ and announced its plans for a strategy to control bTB in cattle.

The badger culling trial (the Krebs trial) aims to determine the impact and effectiveness of badger culling on controlling the spread of bTB. The trial, intended to last for at least five years, began in December 1998 and compares three different control methods in 30 areas of around 100km² where the recent incidence of bTB has been relatively high. The areas are grouped into 10 sets of ‘triplets’ each part of which is treated differently

• ‘Proactive’ culling of all badgers. Area to be kept clear for the rest of the trial.
• ‘Reactive’ culling of all badgers associated with farms where bTB has been confirmed.
• ‘Survey only’ where no badger culling takes place.

The House of Commons Agriculture Committee examined the Government’s implementation of the Krebs Report and published their findings on 27 April 1999⁵. The Committee “accepted that Krebs’ conclusions of evidence of a link between badgers and bTB in cattle was compelling but not conclusive and that field trial is required to test and quantify the link between badgers and cattle”. The Committee also made a number of other recommendations including

• More research into cattle to cattle transmission
• More research into developing a cattle vaccine, building on the work done with human TB vaccine
• More research should be carried out into the cause of the rising incidence in bovine TB, into possible transmission routes other than badgers and into the role of trace elements in susceptibility to the disease.
• Immediate attention should be paid to identifying husbandry practices that could reduce the risk of cattle becoming infected.
• Dates of the last bTB test should be included in cattle passports.

The Woodland Trust is sympathetic to the impact that bTB has on farmers’ livelihoods. However, we do not believe that the Krebs trial is sufficiently robust to produce conclusive evidence towards determining the role of badgers in the spread of bovine TB. There are a number of reasons:

• DEFRA data suggests that culling 100% of badgers in an area is virtually impossible and that use of cage traps can capture only 80% of individual
• The Government cannot compulsorily gain access to land and more than 30% of landowners have refused access.
• Badger culls, in the past, have frequently been sabotaged through direct action.
• Evidence from DEFRA’s reports, badger groups and farming union reps indicate that some landowners, especially in bTB “hot-spots”, have been killing badgers illegally for some time¹⁴.
• One of the critical aspects of the trial is to measure change in the number of reported cases of bTB in the ‘proactive’ and ‘reactive’ areas, to the proportion of the badgers that have been culled from those areas. However when there is currently no reliable method to estimate badger numbers, it will not be possible to measure the proportion of badgers culled.

The Woodland Trust believes that, regardless of the statistical validity of the trial, if the Government decides that killing badgers does reduce bTB in cattle, then large-scale eradication of badgers may be proposed. However, even if culling is shown to reduce bTB in cattle, the Trust is concerned that, given the lack of sufficiently detailed research into the effectiveness of other disease control methods, the trials will be unable to determine whether badger culling is the most effective and most cost effective way of controlling the disease. It is also highly questionable as to whether such a large-scale eradication programme would be politically and publicly acceptable or practically possible.

Because the Trust does not believe that the trials are sufficiently robust and because we believe there is sufficient doubt as to the role that badgers play in spreading bTB, the Woodland Trust will continue to refuse DEFRA access to sites in our ownership for the purpose of culling badgers in trial areas.

The Woodland Trust believes that government policy across the UK should promote biodiversity by enabling the widest range of our native habitats and species to survive and evolve. For this reason we would wish to see a broader approach taken to tackling bTB. This would include:
¨ Development of a “Plan B”, involving research into alternative strategies, given we believe the Krebs trial will not provide clear results
¨ A cessation to the persistent focus on badgers and killing them as the response to bTB, and a shift of resources and research to support cattle-based solutions, which are already known to be effective.