Following a government E-petition signed by 155,000 members of the public, MPs will debate the proposed cull of badgers in Somerset and Gloucestershire to control bovine TB on Thursday 25th October. To support the debate POST have produced a one page briefing, a 'POSTbox', that summarises the historic timeline of Bovine Tuberculosis Disease Control (
PDF 188 KB) in the UK.
The call for the parliamentary debate was supported by a cross-party group of 36 MPs. The motion to be debated states: "This house recognises that significant, independent scientific research has demonstrated that culling badgers will have little effect on reducing the rate of bovine TB; acknowledges that culling may even exacerbate the problem; notes that the e-petition against the current plans for culling passed in a very short period of time the 100,000 figure required to make it eligible for debate in parliament and that it continues to attract impressive levels of support from members of the public; calls on the government to stop any planned or present culling of badgers; and further calls on the government to introduce a vaccination programme and measures to improve biosecurity with immediate effect."