Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, on what date cage trapping and shooting of badgers was implemented alongside the free-shooting of badgers in the pilot badger cull in Somerset in 2013; and on what date free shooting had started in that cull.

Cage trapping was used from the outset in each of the pilot areas. Under the licence issued to each area, cage trapping and shooting and controlled shooting are both permitted control methods. No further authorisation from the Department was required.

The Guidance issued to Natural England on issuing licenses to kill or take badgers for the purpose of preventing the spread of bovine TB under section 10(2)(a) of the Protection of Badgers Act 1992, and the Government's policy document on Bovine TB and badger control in England, both state ‘in order to ensure humaneness, only two culling methods will be permitted (which can be used in combination, or as single control methods): i. cage-trapping followed by shooting; and ii. controlled shooting.' Both of these documents were published on 14^th December 2011.