Badger Cull

Mary Creagh Excerpts

Thursday 25th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)]

We have heard a range of passionate and fairly well-informed contributions to this debate on a very difficult subject. I was pleased to hear from the Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), and I look forward to the Committee’s report.

Today’s debate certainly forced all of us to view the issue at a much deeper level. My hon. Friends the Members for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) and for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) spoke of the weaknesses in on-farm biosecurity. We heard passionate speeches from the hon. Members for Shrewsbury and Atcham (Daniel Kawczynski), for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) and for Central Devon (Mel Stride), the hon. and learned Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr Cox) and the hon. Members for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin), for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies), for Sherwood (Mr Spencer), for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams), for Stroud (Neil Carmichael), for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) and for Congleton (Fiona Bruce). They all spoke about the devastating impact of the disease on farmers.

We heard alternative views from my hon. Friends the Members for Inverclyde (Mr McKenzie) and for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), who spoke of the risk that bovine TB would spread in the short term as a result of a badger cull. The hon. Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders) criticised the design of the Government’s cull. The hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) made a thoughtful speech from an international perspective, drawing attention to the costs of the cull. The hon. Members for Crawley (Henry Smith) and for Southend West (Mr Amess) suggested other options, as did the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller), who gently punctured some of the Secretary of State’s claims to expertise in this matter.

We were privileged to hear from former Agriculture Ministers, including the right hon. Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Sir James Paice). My right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), who is in his place, also struggled with these issues when he was in government, and my hon. Friends the Members for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) and for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) described what happened under the Labour Government. It is important to put on the record that so far only a Labour Government have actually carried out a badger cull and tested the science in the field. I strongly predict that we will remain the only Government to carry out a badger cull in the field. I will explain why I make that prediction shortly.

My hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) coined a new word: the ineptocracy, which will be on the record in Hansard. The hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) described the heartache of farmers, and the hon. Member for Hove (Mike Weatherley) and my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Mr Reed) talked about the effect of perturbation.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) and the Backbench Business Committee on securing the debate and on making sure such a wide range of perspectives was expressed. The existence of this motion and debate—and vote—have certainly contributed to the Government’s decision to drop the badger cull. The Opposition have warned the Government for two years that the cull would be bad for farmers, taxpayers and wildlife. It would be bad for farmers who have to deal with this terrible disease. I also know the toll the disease takes on farmers and their families, both personally and financially, but the Government’s own cost-benefit assessment said the cull would cost farmers more than it would save them.

We saw in the last six weeks that farmers were moving away from the free shooting of badgers and moving towards the cage trapping of badgers, yet the Government’s statistics show free shooting is 10 times cheaper than cage trapping. Will the Minister tell us the true costs of this to the farmers? I would also like to hear from the Minister about the size of bond that the two farm companies had lodged with Natural England. So far we have heard no mention from Ministers about how much farmers are required to pay up front to cover the full four-year costs of this cull. If there is a move to cage trapping and shooting, what training has been given to those responsible for carrying that out, because that is a different skill from free shooting? We know that the people involved in free shooting had to go on a badger anatomy course so as to get a clean kill when shooting badgers. Pistols are used for cage trapping and shooting, so that is a totally different technique. Will the Minister tell us whether that training has been given, because it certainly seems from the evidence on the ground that that was what was planned?

There has been a lot of talk in this debate about the science, and we heard a good exposition from the hon. Member for St Ives. It is important that we go back to John Krebs. I do not advocate that we go back to 1997 as the Secretary of State does. I am disappointed that he is not in his place, and I am disappointed about his earlier remark in the House that he “couldn’t take any more.” He has only been in the job six weeks. I have been studying the issue of the badger cull for 18 months—as have other hon. Members, along with farmers out there in the community who are living with this problem—and I think the Secretary of State will have to show a little more backbone.

Professor Lord John Krebs instigated the randomised badger culling trial, and took part in the review of the evidence with Sir Bob Watson last year. Lord Krebs stressed the fact that culling badgers makes TB worse at the beginning by spreading the disease. He stated clearly in the Lords on Tuesday that the badger cull would reduce the incidence of TB in cattle by 16% after nine years, leaving 84% of the problem still there. He said that

“this is not a reduction in absolute terms but actually a 16% reduction from the trend increase.”

In other words, as the background trend is going up, BTB still increases but not by as much as it would have done had the cull not been conducted. This cull is not the silver bullet the Secretary of State makes it out to be. The eminent zoologist Lord John Krebs continues:

“The number is not the 30% that the NFU quoted; that is misleading—a dishonest filleting of the data.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 23 October 2012; Vol. 740, c. 148.]

Disappointingly, it appears, judging by his response to the debate in this morning’s DEFRA questions, that the Secretary of State has not read the Hansard record of that Lords debate, where the scientists were sitting there. He persisted in misusing a snapshot figure—the 28%—instead of using the one figure that the scientists are agreed on, which is the 16% figure. The Minister is looking puzzled. I hope that he is still not confused, because he is going to get a lambasting from the scientists. The Government are cherry-picking the data. Perturbation increases bovine TB, in the perimeter areas, by 29%, but I have chosen not to use that figure in any of the rhetoric or debate on this matter because it represents a snapshot; those perturbation increases happen in the early stages and are not borne out by the reduction that occurs afterwards.

The Secretary of State is not in his place, but he referred to Christl Donnelly as a “he” during his statement on Tuesday—Christl is a she.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr David Heath)]

She is a she.

[Mary Creagh]

Well, that is a relief. I do not know why the Minister has not told the Secretary of State that, because he is reported in Hansard as saying that she is a he. [Interruption.] He appears not to have read his own Hansard record or corrected it. He obviously has not spoken to the scientists, who faced down the animal rights activists during Labour’s badger cull in order to carry out the Labour Government’s research into culling badgers. We are not talking about some animal rights activists; these are scientists in the field wanting to get the right outcome for farmers and for the nation.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Secretary of State’s comparing the research on a vaccine to Sisyphus, who, as you doubtless know, Mr Speaker, rolled a rock up a hill only to watch it roll down again for all eternity, demonstrates not only a complete lack of understanding of the scientific method, but contempt for scientific research? We can have no confidence in the promotion of a vaccine under the Secretary of State’s leadership.

[Mary Creagh]

The Secretary of State got his Sisyphus mixed up with his Tantalus. I think he will find that he has undertaken the labours of Hercules in DEFRA—I will not go any further on that, but the Augean stables spring to mind. I agree with what my hon. Friend said, because I am concerned that the scientists are being ripped to pieces on this, and the situation is difficult. She rightly says that there is a scientific method: the scientists are paid to come up with solutions, and then we try to roll them out and test them in field conditions. That is what needs to be done.

I have asked a lot of parliamentary questions. The Secretary of State asked 600, but perhaps some of his data are less than fresh. My data are pretty fresh. Last year, I asked the Government how many cattle herds breakdowns would be prevented over nine years if the cull went ahead. The answer came back that using a 150 km area, 47 cattle breakdowns would be prevented over nine years. So if we double the cull area and if it was to go ahead in a 300 sq km area, 94 herd breakdowns would be prevented. That, again, is not a fantastic result for the huge investment involved in this cull.

There has been huge concern from the scientists about the lack of Government rigour in the design, implementation, monitoring and efficacy of these culls. We know that there would be no post-mortem testing of whether the badgers had bovine TB, but there would be post-mortem testing to see whether they had been shot cleanly. So those who are interested in science, and who want to know how much of a vector in this disease the badgers are, will again have to go back to Labour’s cull, which showed that only 12% of the animals actually carried the disease.

[Sir James Paice]

I want to challenge the hon. Lady again on these figures. I did not dispute, in my speech, the 16% figure, and I do not believe anyone else has done. That is the figure agreed by all the scientists. I want her to confirm that that 16% is the net overall figure, and that if we could reduce or even eliminate perturbation, the net figure is bound to be much higher than that. That is part of the objective in the design of these pilots.

[Mary Creagh]

The scientists gave a range of between 12% and 16% if the cull was carried out under exactly the same conditions as Labour’s RBCT. The cull that the right hon. Gentleman proposed differed significantly, as it would have taken place over six weeks rather than two and would have involved free shooting rather than cage-trapping and shooting. As any GCSE science student knows, as soon as we depart from the methodology, we immediately increase the range of the differentials in the results. That is why the scientists were concerned.

The lack of rigour in the methodology was shown in Tuesday’s announcement. A cull that depends on killing at least 70% of the animals was about to begin with no reliable estimate of how many needed to be shot. On 19 July 2011, I asked a question in Parliament on that exact point, because it had occurred to me, a mere humble member of Her Majesty’s Opposition. I received the answer

“there is no precise knowledge of the size of the badger population”.—[Official Report, 19 July 2011; Vol. 531, c. 815.]

That prompts the question of why Ministers did not ask that. Why did they not start the count then so that farmers could plan properly? Instead, they allowed the farmers to submit their own estimates of the numbers, thought, “Mm, that looks a bit low,” and left it until September to go out into the field and conduct the analysis that should have been done a year ago. I want Ministers to tell us whether those numbers were calibrated to test their accuracy. It seems clear to me that they were not.

[Fiona Bruce]

rose—

[Mary Creagh]

I will not give way, because I want to hear some answers from the Minister.

We also warned that the cull would be bad for taxpayers. What are the taxpayer costs so far? A freedom of information request to the Badger Trust reveals the cost of the big society badger cull. To date, licensing activities by Natural England have cost £300,000. The sett monitoring that only took place right at the very end of the process in September has cost £750,000. The independent expert panel that is meeting to oversee the two pilots has cost £17,000. Since April 2012, there have been 6.5 full-time equivalent staff working on the cull. This cull, which I confidently predict will not take place, has already cost taxpayers well over £1 million. We can add on £500,000 per cull area per year for policing. Let us not forget that all leave has been cancelled for the police in Gloucestershire until Christmas. Although I am sure they will be relieved to have their leave uncancelled, how much has that cost the police? Again, the Secretary of State said on Tuesday that he would write to let us know

What about the future costs? Humaneness monitoring will cost £700,000. Badger post-mortems will cost £248,000. My parliamentary question to Ministers, however, about the net reduction in compensation and testing were the badger cull to go ahead received the answer that it would save just £2.9 million over 10 years in each cull area. That is just not good enough. It will carry on costing taxpayers until Ministers cancel it definitively.

The writing is on the wall for this badger cull. The costs to farmers and taxpayers will continue to stack up if Ministers continue to pretend that the cull will go ahead. We need to ensure that any solution works closely with farmers and I hope for their sake that the Minister will drop this charade that the cull will go ahead. Any solution will also require the consent of taxpayers and we must ensure that we get the best value for them, too.

--- Later in debate ---

That this House notes the e-petition on the planned badger cull, which has gathered more than 150,000 signatures; and calls on the Government to stop the cull and implement the more sustainable and humane solution of both a vaccination programme for badgers and cattle, along with improved testing and biosecurity.

[Mary Creagh]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. May we have an indication from the Minister that the Government will go back and look again at the whole policy of the badger cull, and respect the democratic voice of this Parliament?

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Lady has made her point with force and alacrity and, as she will know, it is on the record of the House. As she will also know, that is not a matter for the Chair; it is not a point of order although it will have been heard by the Minister on the Treasury Bench.

I call Mr Mark Pritchard on a point of order—I hope it is a point of order.