Dr. Eoin Ryan:

Turning to the question about TB and large building works, the Department of agriculture does not have a role in objecting or agreeing to infrastructure that is not within the Department's remit. However, we have carried out and supported research on the impact of major infrastructure projects like road building. This goes back to the original question from the Cathaoirleach about research to inform these things. That research was done in conjunction with UCD and it was published. It found that major infrastructure projects like building a new motorway can disturb local badger setts.

One of the benefits of badger vaccination is that one can vaccinate badger populations in the area before there is a TB outbreak. It is important to remember that badgers are a protected species. You cannot cull badgers just in case. You can only do it under very specific criteria when there is a bovine TB outbreak in a herd that is epidemiologically attributed to those badgers. You cannot say that we are building a road so something should be done. However, you can vaccinate badgers in advance because that is protecting their own health. The other point to mention is that, because badgers are a protected species, their setts are protected. There are frameworks with the National Parks and Wildlife Service and appropriate bodies for anybody carrying out these works where a badger sett is to be disturbed. That applies across the way. That is not within the Department of agriculture's remit. I am aware of it because our work on badgers crosses these areas. That is one of the reasons badger vaccination is a really useful tool to protect farmers and cattle. It is not to protect the badgers. If we have vaccinated the badgers, it means that, if they are disturbed or made more susceptible to TB, they have been provided with a degree of population immunity before there is an outbreak in cattle. We should not wait for it to spill over into the cattle so that we can say there is now an outbreak attributable to badgers. We should do something in advance. That is the benefit of that tool.