Last week, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) ordered Natural England to publish the results of an impact assessment on the removal of badgers, and the effect this may have on other predators.

The assessment was conducted after the government’s research agency FERA (Which has since been privatised) warned that removing dominant predators from ecosystems could have impacts on other wildlife that are “hard to predict” and urged Defra to carry out more in-depth analysis ahead of the badger culls which began in Gloucestershire and Somerset in 2013.

Badger culling has since been extended to other areas of Somerset and Gloucestershire, as well as Dorset, Cornwall, Herefordshire and Wiltshire, and culling could begin in new areas later this year. The policy forms part of Defra’s plan to eradicate bovine TB, which led to the slaughter of 29,000 cattle in 2016, but it has proven deeply controversial; independent experts maintain that the government’s landowner-led culls won’t have an impact on bovine TB levels, and culls in Somerset and Gloucestershire were deemed to have failed in two out of three areas on which there were assessed in 2013, the only year in which any independent oversight of culling was allowed.

Natural England has said it is “Considering” the ICO’s instruction, but the ruling could be a blow for the badger cull policy. The quango, which acts as licensing body for the cull, had previously refused to make public the results of its analysis, claiming they could put landowners at risk of harassment and intimidation.

On 4th July, the ICO ruled that “Natural England was incorrect” to cite public safety clauses for withholding information requested under a freedom of information request. The Commissioner’s Office ordered Natural England to publish any withheld information (minus personal data or businesses names) within 35 days.

If the quango refuses to release its documents, the case will be referred to the High Court as a breach of the Freedom of Information Act, and ICO warned that Natural England’s refusal could be treated as contempt of court. If Natural England has nothing to release, the government’s ‘science led’ badger culling policy will be on even shakier ground. Last year, Lord John Krebs, who designed the ‘randomised badger culling trials’ conducted under the last Labour government, on which the Coalition Government based much of the design of the ongoing culls, has dismissed Defra’s badger culls as part of a “crazy scheme” and a “sideshow”, arguing that better cattle-based measures will be needed to address bovine TB.

Lord Krebs has also criticised the government's failure to back up the roll out of its policy with published data from the two ‘pilot’ culls; the culling policy was extended to new areas of the country before the two trial culls in Somerset and Gloucestershire concluded last year.

Other reports commissioned by Defra and the Welsh government have shown that the removal of badgers could lead other predators, including foxes, to take their place within the ecosystem, which could have knock on effects for prey animals and the spread of disease.

Reacting to the ruling on Monday, Humane Society International’s veterinary adviser Professor Alastair MacMillan said, “HSI is pleased that Natural England is no longer able to use security as a smokescreen for withholding vital badger cull data, and is being forced to reveal analysis of the badger cull’s impact on other species. Studies show that culling badgers is likely to lead to considerable increases in numbers of other predators, making countless species of British wildlife, such as hares and ground nesting birds, indirect victims of the cull.”

“We hope that the ruling forces Natural England to also release data on the efficacy of the badger cull, which we predict will confirm what has been said by leading scientific experts for years, that as well as being inhumane and impractical the cull is completely ineffective.”