Dame Angela Eagle

It is a great pleasure to serve under your watchful eye in Westminster Hall, Mr Stuart, on this first evening back. I begin by acknowledging the strength of feeling in this debate, including from 170 of my constituents in Wallasey and the 102,000-odd members of the public who signed the petition. For many, the idea of culling badgers—a protected species—is deeply upsetting and even unconscionable, and I understand and respect that view. As many have said, this is a totemic and polarising issue. The fact is that over successive years, hundreds of thousands of badgers have been culled indiscriminately across a vast area, stretching from Cornwall to Cheshire and across to the midlands. For valid reasons, many, including the Labour manifesto, have described the policy as ineffective. I will be clear from the outset that this Government are committed to ending the badger cull. We stand by that commitment, and I say again that the badger cull is ending. We have already taken decisive steps to bring the cull to its closure. Bovine TB has a devastating impact on our farming community, as we have heard in great detail from all parts of the House. It has cost the lives of more than 274,000 cattle, compulsorily slaughtered in England because of the disease. It costs the taxpayer over £100 million a year, and it costs farmers dearly in lost income and extra business costs. We have heard about the stress and mental health problems that waiting for those constant tests have subjected many families to. Far too many farmers have suffered profound stress and hardship as a result. They live with the constant anxiety of regular testing, the financial strain of movement restrictions and the heartbreak of losing affected animals, often reared with care and pride over generations. In the year up until June 2025, more than 21,000 cattle were slaughtered in England for bovine TB control. That is fewer than the year before—but that is little consolation for any farmer who has had to watch one of their animals being taken away. Since 2013, more than 247,000 badgers have been culled under licence. That is a very large figure, and a hard figure to hear. Our challenge is to strike the right balance: tackling bovine TB with urgency while protecting our wildlife. The Government are committed to moving decisively towards a future free from this devastating disease, and to doing so in a way that is effective and that earns the trust of the communities most affected. The petition calls for an immediate end to the badger cull and a stronger focus on cattle-based measures. I want to respond to that clearly, because I understand, and we have heard in this debate, how deeply people care about the issue. This debate comes at an important moment—perhaps slightly too early, I must say, but the petitioners are the petitioners, and we get the debates when we get them—since we are refreshing the bovine TB eradication strategy introduced by our predecessors in 2014. It was they who instigated this cull. A new strategy is being co-designed with farmers, vets, scientists, conservationists and the Government, all of whom will have a voice, in an attempt to deal with some of the polarisation in the debate. It will be informed by independent evidence in the review led by Professor Sir Charles Godfray. The update to that review, which was published on 4 September, has been referred to on several occasions. On the role of badgers, the petition argues that wildlife are being scapegoated. I understand the use of that word, but we must be clear that transmission runs both ways within species and between cattle and badgers, as has been demonstrated repeatedly by using modern technology such as whole-genome sequencing. We must have an honest debate and, to have an effective policy, we must recognise the reality that TB infections go both ways, from one species to another and back again. The Government’s direction of travel, though, is clear: we are investing in non-lethal interventions—non-lethal for badgers, that is—and cattle-focused measures, including both cattle and badger vaccinations, to end the badger cull by the end of the Parliament. The most sustainable way to protect farms and wildlife is by investing in measures to reduce infection in both species, such as badger and cattle vaccination. Sir Charles Godfray’s evidence review concluded that the overall package of interventions—cattle testing, movement controls and on-farm biosecurity alongside the badger cull policy—has contributed to reducing bovine TB in cattle, but it also concluded that it is not statistically possible to isolate the impact of each individual measure. He said that it was possible to control bovine TB effectively both with a badger cull and without one, and therefore we must see how to move forward in the best possible way, given the manifesto commitment on which we were elected last year. The petitioners, and many voices in the debate, argue that badger culling should stop immediately. They say that it lacks solid scientific evidence, it has gone on too long and it takes the focus away from tackling bovine TB in cattle. But, however much one might sympathise with those views, it is not really about choosing between badgers and cattle. The real question is how to take those facts seriously and decide the best way to keep bearing down on bovine TB until we can finally get rid of it. I say again that the badger cull is ending. The 2025 season is nearly over, and this is the final year of industry-led culling in England’s high-risk and edge areas. To provide a little more information about that, at the height of the badger cull there were 73 licences to cull badgers operating up and down the country, and in this season there are 21. By the end of this season only one licensed cull will remain. It will continue until the end of the season and then there will be an analysis to see how effective it has been scientifically. A decision will then be made about whether to continue with that final licence.