Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

That is a most unfortunate answer because in the context of a badger cull we are talking about a most inhumane, cruel and barbaric way of dealing with bovine TB, when first, it has not been fully proven that the badger is totally responsible for the disease, and there are doubts over some of the experiments that initially proved that was the case. Second, a reduction in TB in cattle can also be linked to improved husbandry and other factors, not especially through the badger cull. Could the Minister explain the urgency to kill thousands of an ecologically important species, namely, the badger?

I refer to an IT glitch that occurred in the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs in England which meant it overstated the number of cattle herds infected by TB in Britain to such an extent that the decline in TB was shown to have been in the year preceding the badger cull. A badger cull is a particularly cruel way to deal with the problem. Illegal ways are in use to kill badgers. Such horrible practices, include putting slurry in badger setts, and throwing badger carcases onto the road to give the impression they have been killed in road accidents. That is what is happening to a badger population that we do not know is 100% responsible for bovine TB.

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