Badger Culling/Bovine TB
Debate between Caroline Lucas and Paul Monaghan(7 years, 8 months ago)
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Dr Monaghan
The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point and I will come to it shortly.
In 2013, more than 6 million bTB skin tests were performed in England in an attempt to identify the disease, leading to the slaughter of more than 26,000 cattle. These tests are only 20% to 50% effective. One quarter of herds in the south-west and west midlands regions of England have been placed under movement restrictions at some point, and in the last decade the rising incidence of the disease has cost the UK taxpayer more than £500 million. Today, 20% of all new herd breakdowns are detected in the slaughterhouse, such is the ineffectiveness of current testing programmes.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
The cost of culling is around £5,000 per badger compared with just £700 for a badger vaccinated. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that not only is culling counterproductive and cruel, but it is a vast waste of money?
Dr Monaghan
The hon. Lady is ahead of me. I am just coming to that point.
In 2014 the UK Government’s inability to bring the disease under control resulted in a cost to UK taxpayers of almost £100 million, with additional costs to farmers estimated to run to tens of millions of pounds annually. There is also a significant human cost. Bovine TB causes misery for farmers. I suspect that many Members here today will have heard stories of farms effectively being closed because of the disease, farmers being made bankrupt and, sadly, some farmers even taking their own lives, such is the impact on businesses of the failure to address the disease effectively.
If the UK Government do not begin to manage the rising incidence of this disease in England, there will be not only an increase in the number of beef and dairy herds affected, but further geographical spread and a consequent spiralling cost to UK taxpayers over the next decade of potentially £1 billion. That figure comes from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.