Badger cull protester held at 
Defra site

A man, reported to be an anti-badger cull protester, has been arrested at a site belonging to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

The man was held at Aston Down in Stroud by Gloucestershire Police on suspicion of aggravated trespass at the site.

Campaigners against the cull have said they are gearing up to protest against the “inhumane” measure.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Activists from campaign group Stop The Cull have already gathered in Gloucestershire, where one of two pilot schemes will take place, to form a “wounded badger patrol”.

They claim the cull is expected to start today and they are on “amber alert”, according to the group’s website.

Defra said the authorised cull companies will decide when the badger cull will begin.

The culls are taking place in west Gloucestershire and west Somerset to combat the spread of bovine tuberculosis (TB), which the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) said led to the slaughter of 38,000 cattle last year.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The culls, which will be carried out annually for four years, last six weeks and are allowed to take place between June 1 and January 31.

If they are successful in stopping the spread of bovine TB, they could be rolled out nationally, saving millions in compensation to farmers.

Green Party leader Natalie Bennett said: “I completely understand the distress that the continuing problem of TB in cattle is causing to farmers. But wanting to do something should not be pushing this Government to make the terrible decision to go ahead with this cull, which could actually magnify the TB problem.”

Shadow environment secretary Mary Creagh said via Twitter that the cull is “bad for farmers, bad for taxpayers and bad for wildlife”.

A Defra spokesman said: “In TB hotspots such as Gloucestershire and Somerset we need to deal with the infection in badgers if we’re to get a grip on TB there.”