Amazing news. And thanks for all the great comments.
💥💥💥💥
BUT …
Well, first of all, I certainly don’t claim any credit for this. The decision was dated the day of the transmission of our documentary, which is serendipitous, but probably no more than that. Secondly, this is good news and will save the lives of some badgers – but it’s not enough. There are still licenses to cull in place, which at the moment the Labour Government is proposing to leave active, meaning that tens of thousands of badgers will still be killed in the next two years. So the battle is not won yet, by a long way. Quite incredible to me that I went into battle to help elect this Government on the clear understanding that Kier Starmer himself had promised to stop the badger cull. And now I’m reluctant to go into bat AGAINST this government, but things do not yet look good.
The story seems to be that if they are to stop the cull, they have to replace it with something. But anyone who saw the documentary will clearly understand that the cull is achieving NOTHING, and so halting it does not leave a gap. The truth is there has been a gap, amounting to dire negligence, over the entire past 12 years. We, as the Gatcombe team have much more to offer than you saw in the film. We showed you an intensive dairy farm, where slurry was a major part of the problem, but each farm is different, with a different story, and different solutions needed. We looked at many examples. But they all hinge around understanding the mechanism of infection from cow to cow, not badger to cow, and most are soluble. Once the killing of badgers is over, it will never be necessary to talk about them again in the context of cattle farming.
Don’t believe me ? Fine. Just have a look around you in 10 years time.
Bri