THE issue of badgers and TB seems to be an intractable one. TB is a classic disease of overcrowding and it may well be that the current population level is partly to blame. However, a widespread cull may actually make matters worse because fleeing badgers may spread the disease further.

If a cull takes place then how it is done will obviously have an impact on the badgers' welfare. In this light I was interested to note that The League Against Cruel Sports is campaigning against Government proposals to shoot "free-running badgers" on the grounds that shooting carries a high risk of wounding and that animals shot at dusk will not be able to be followed up.

Their ex-chief executive has stated: "From an animal welfare perspective, shooting at free-running badgers is the worst of all the options, because it carries with it a serious risk of non-fatal shootings."

The League has a point and it might want to refer to research done by the All Parliamentary Middle Way Group that showed high wounding rates in shot foxes. However, during the Hunting Debate this evidence was dismissed, with their welfare advisor Professor Stephen Harris stating: "There simply aren't any wounded foxes from shooting in the countryside as far as I'm concerned."

I have long campaigned against the method of flushing and shooting deer which involves driving them towards guns and shooting them all as they run.

The International Fund for Animal Welfare agrees that this cannot be done safely. I also consulted Michael Yardley, a shooting expert and journalist about this technique, and he called it "despicable".

However, the League insists that this technique is "humane" and I am condemned as a cruel criminal because I refuse to shoot them.

They then campaign against flushing out birds and shooting them.

Why is it humane to shoot foxes and deer in circumstances with a high degree of wounding and inhumane to shoot badgers and birds?

It is worth noting that well over 100,000 foxes are shot every year.

Thousands of these animals are wounded and die hideously.

Giles Bradshaw

Rose Ash