We have now discovered that the firm doing the survey work on setts
in the cull area, prior to trapping and shooting the badgers, is
Thomson Ecology
enquiries@thomsonecology.com
Head Office
Compass House
60 Priestley Road
Guildford
Surrey GU2 7YU
Please send them a (polite) email/letter expressing your feelings
about their willingness to help with the slaughter of badgers.
Further links and information about this firm from :
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/05/450619.html
April meeting
Our meeting in Aberystwyth on 24th April was extremely successful - we had a turnout of around 100 which exceeded our expectations and shows how concerned and worried many people are. People came from all over Wales - from Cardiff up to North Wales.
Speakers included Dr Dan Forman of Swansea University and Lizzie Wilberforce of the Wildlife Trust. They were joined by Celia Thomas, a cattle farmer from the cull area and Ian Doucet, legal advisor to Pembrokeshire Against the Cull. Many messages of support were also received including ones from Julie Christie, Brian May, George Monbiot and Iolo Williams.
Celia Thomas, who is a cattle owner in the cull area, and chairperson of PAC, began the afternoon by telling us how one-sided the self-labelled 'holistic' WAG policy is in the cull area. Although the cull is compulsory, and involves highly draconian legislation and self-appointed powers to force landowners to comply with the killing, many of the so-called 'strict cattle measures' being introduced at the same time are merely 'recommended' and 'voluntary' as well as limited in scope.
Dr Forman, who lectures in wildlife ecology, followed with a brilliant, engaging and detailed presentation of the science. He stressed his sympathy for farmers in the current situation but showed that all the evidence to date tells us that culling badgers will not help, and in fact is highly likely to make matters worse. He also presented potentially serious knock-on effects on the ecosystem, leading to further problems. He stressed that the science, and sheer common sense, indicate that bovine Tb is a disease of cattle, and as such needs to be dealt with in cattle
Lizzie Wilberforce Conservation Officer for the Wildlife Trust, followed with a look at the serious negative impact the cull would have on the work of the Trust - in fact making it impossible to fulfil any of the Trust's four main objectives - as well as the inevitable damage to the local ecology. She also pointed out the sheer divisiveness of the culling policy - not least in the way in which it is being portrayed as a division between different social groups - country against town, English-speakers against Welsh-speakers etc.- when this is not the reality. We have been approached by many farming people, as well as other country residents (from what is, after all, a largely rural area) both Welsh and English, who recognize the folly of a cull. In the meeting itself, a local Welsh speaker got up to say he had previously supported the cull but now he had heard the facts, had changed his mind - and felt that farmers were being given misleading and incomplete information from WAG.
In conclusion, Ian Doucet touched on some of the human rights implications of the powers taken by the WAG to enforce compliance, and the secrecy with which the cull is being implemented. He highlighted the case of an 87 year old lady living alone, who is nervous at the prospect of anonymous men coming on to her land with guns. She has therefore asked to be notified when the cull operatives are coming, so that she can arrange for someone to be with her. However the WAG have refused to give her any prior warning. For further information and links, go to www.pembrokeshireagainstthecull.org.uk
We are hoping to go on to organize further events in the near future, and would welcome any feedback, suggestions or offers of help from anyone who feels they would like to be involved. Please let us know if you would like to be kept informed of further action/campaigning/events.
Meanwhile we are asking people to email and/or write to;
Tourism Dept.,
Pembrokeshire County Council,
County Hall,
Haverfordwest,
Pembrokeshire
SA61 1TP
tourism@pembrokeshire.gov.uk
(and ask for an answer to your specific points)
and to send/email a copy to Carwyn Jones (as WAG First: Minister)
Carwyn Jones AM,
36 Caroline St,
Bridgend,
CF31 1DQ
carwyn.jones@wales.gov.uk
carwyn.jones@wales.gsi.gov.uk
(Again, ask for a specific answer and not a form letter)
JUDICIAL REVIEW JUDGEMENT, Update
While of course the ruling by Justice Lloyd Jones in Swansea Crown Court on Thursday that WAG have the legal power to go ahead with the planned cull in Pembrokeshire and Ceredigion was very disappointing, a great deal of evidence came out in the court that has publicly called WAG's culling policy into serious doubt.
The judgement itself is based only on very narrow legal grounds and in no way represents an approval or endorsement of the policy on scientific, economic or ethical grounds, or of its likely effectiveness in reducing TB.
The judgement runs to 40 pages (!) and we hope to have a more thorough analysis available soon from the Badger Trust's lawyers. Meanwhile we will also have an update on the implications of the judgement from Ian Doucet, who advises PAC on legal issues and will be speaking at our Public Meeting in Aberystwyth on 24th April (details below). .
We feel it is more vital than ever to continue to to inform as many people as possible of the issues involved, and to publicise what WAG's policy of badger culling will really mean for all of us.
We hope to see as many of you as possible at our meeting - remember that this is Elin Jones's own constituency, and we need to send a very clear message to her that there is strong public opposition to this unacceptable policy of wildlife slaughter. www.pembrokeshireagainstthecull.org.uk
www.savethebadger.com
www.badgers.org.uk
Meanwhile we feel it is vital to give PAC (Pembrokeshire Against the Cull) all the support we can, and at the same time, to raise public awareness in our own area as to what is about to be carried out in our name - as well as the threat of the cull being extended to our own area. We are holding a
The Old College, Aberystwyth
(opposite the pier)
Speakers will include Dr Dan Forman of Swansea University, Lizzie Wilberforce of the South and West Wales Wildlife Trust, and representatives from PAC.
This will be an interesting and informative meeting, and an opportunity to hear the science and catch up with news of the campaign.. There will also be an opportunity to ask questions and to voice your own concerns, as well as to discuss what we can all do.
PLEASE PASS THIS ON to as many people as you think may be interested, and bring as many with you as you can
The Welsh Assembly are claiming that the cull has the support of the majority, please help us to show them they're wrong!
ALSO if anyone can give any time to help, or would like to find out more, please contact us
How will the cull impact on our own area?
As well as supporting PAC, who are having to face the appalling prospect of wholesale badger slaughter on their doorstep , we are also deeply concerned for our own area. If the cull goes ahead (there are still several challenges in the pipeline - details below), we will almost inevitably have severely stressed survivors fleeing into badger territories here and fighting with our own badger groups. Badgers escaping the slaughter and disintegration of their social groups will obviously have severely compromised immune systems, leaving them vulnerable to any latent TB infection - with the result that they may then develop the active and infectious stage of the disease and pass this on through bite wounds, thus ensuring that the disease is spread to otherwise healthy populations. This is the process known as 'perturbation' and possibly the most compelling reason against the culling of badgers. It has been shown (primarily by data collected during the ISG, or RCBT, trials in England - the only large scale scientifically controlled and validated study to date) that this leads to a higher incidence of TB infection in badgers, as well as an increase in herd TB breakdowns in areas surrounding a cull.. It is for this reason (among others) that the ISG team of scientists concluded that 'badger culling can have no meaningful part to play in the control of bovine TB anywhere in Britain'.It is also for this reason that Dr Chris Cheeseman (one of the authors of the report) has recently called on the Welsh Assembly to abandon the cull, and has described it as a "perverse decision which flies in the face of the science".
Another major flaw in the Welsh Assembly's 'TB Eradication Strategy' is that there will be no way (or even any attempt) to evaluate the effectiveness, or otherwise, of badger culling as distinct from the cattle movement control and biosecurity measures also being applied at the same time and in the same area. Those same cattle measures have already been shown to reduce the incidence of TB (in cattle and badgers) and will inevitably also reduce the incidence in the so-called 'Intensive Treatment Area' (in fact, they are already doing so) so allowing WAG to claim success for the combined strategy. And WAG have already said that 'if the strategy is successful' they will consider 'rolling it out' to other parts of Wales - in fact, they have already given themselves the legislated powers to do so. As a neighbouring area, we may well be next.
For Trevor Lawson's (of the Badger Trust) report on TB and badgers in Wales, which contains a great deal of well-researched information, click here
For Badger Watch and Rescue Dyfed leaflet 'FAQs on Bovine TB', click here
Guardian article by George Monbiot