The BBC's Panorama programme has investigated the badger cull, intended to halt bovine TB in England, which was due to go ahead this autumn in areas of the South-West. The programme was broadcast on Monday (12th November) and featured interviews with cull supporters as well as the policy’s various opponents.

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Speaking on the programme, Environment Secretary Owen Paterson stated, "There has been absolutely no change to policy. We are quite determined to go ahead with two pilot culls, but we need to do them under the right conditions. If we do not go ahead with this we are condemning our cattle industry to a hopeless future and I am not prepared to sit by and do that."

Culling was due to take place in two 300km2 areas of Somerset and Gloucestershire. However, the government abruptly halted plans to conduct culling on 23rd October, just days before culling was due to commence in the two pilot areas.

However, although government sources and farming industry mouthpieces featured on the programme claimed that culling would result in a 16 percent reduction in the instance of bovine TB, and that this reduction merits killing 70 percent of badgers in cull areas, their claims were brought into question by wildlife advocates and independent scientists, who pointed out that the cull-lobby’s proposed methodology remains untested.

The programme suggested that badger numbers have been on the rise since the end of last century, when they were accorded legal protection under the Bern convention, adding that over the same period of time, cases of bovine TB have been on the rise. However, the Badger Trust maintains that this is unfounded and there is no grounds to suggest badger numbers have increased since the last official estimate in 1997.

Badger Trust spokesperson Jack Reedy added that, "Britain enjoyed 20 years with about 1,000 cattle slaughtered annually. The number [of reactors slaughtered] rose when testing was disrupted by BSE and foot and mouth, but for 16 years the industry stood out against pre-movement testing." In response to claims that bTB has never been brought under control without resorting to killing wildlife, the Trust spokesperson responded, "The UK did. We brought the total of cattle slaughtered down from 47,476 in 1938 to 628 in 1979 without killing wildlife. If there was a 'wildlife reservoir' then it could have had little effect – and such a reservoir could not have suddenly appeared when infection began to soar after 1990."

NFU reacts to RSPCA calls to ‘name and shame’ culling companies

Following the broadcast, the NFU accused RSPCA chief Gavin grant of "overstepping the mark," after the animal welfare executive called for the naming and shaming of cull companies; the union had previously balked at the RSPCA's calls for a boycott of milk from cull areas over the cull proposals.

NFU Policy Director Martin Haworth said, "With these comments the RSPCA's Chief Executive Gavin Grant has overstepped the mark and in doing so confirmed our worst fears that the RSPCA is no longer a responsible organisation with animal welfare at its core.

"Mr Grant has actively encouraged people to identify farmers and those carrying out the badger cull pilots next year without a thought for their safety, their family's safety or the security of their homes. This is tantamount to inciting a campaign of fear and intimidation which I find wholly unacceptable and completely irresponsible."

Mr Grant denied inciting a campaign of intimidation, stating that his intention was to increase transparency, so milk buyers are empowered to choose whether or not to support badger culling. He said, "I am totally opposed to personal intimidation. The RSPCA is a responsible organisation, [but] I think that there is a groundswell of opinion in communities across the nation as a whole and indeed in parliament that this is the wrong solution to a difficult problem."

NFU president Peter Kendall, who was also interviewed for the programme, used his appearance to suggest that people working for cull licensing body Natural England had acted to jeopardise the proposal, secretly wishing the cull would fail. He said, "There is a view that there are some people who have not been as helpful as they could have been in delivering this policy."

In September 2011, Kendall complained to former environment secretary Caroline Spelman that Natural England had submitted a partisan response to the public consultation on badger culling. The quango's submission revealed grave misgivings over the feasibility of culling as proposed by Defra and the NFU.

The Panorama programme, Badgers: Dodging the Bullet? can be watched in full here

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