The new Government passed 100 days in power under fire for robbing pensioners of winter fuel allowances, grabbing free football tickets, concert tickets, luxury suits and gratis glasses, insulting a potential investor and scrapping our only deterrent to illegal channel boat crossings. By the law of averages, I suppose it had to produce a good idea eventually. I heartily welcome the Labour administration's announcement it will scrap badger culling by 2029, carry out a badger census and develop a vaccine to protect badgers and cattle from TB.
As I have written here before I could never understand why legally-protected animals like badgers were being slaughtered on the flimsiest of evidence that they passed TB to cattle. Wild Things: The birdwatching year in books A fascinating TV programme featuring campaigner Brian May of the pop group Queen exposed doubts about official methods of TB testing for cattle and the Government announced badger killing will be replaced by injections. Some 230,000 badgers have been killed since the cull, which costs taxpayers an estimated £100 million per year, began in 2013.
We can only wait to see whether the Government keeps its promise against a backdrop of protest from farmers. There's good news from the bird world, too. White storks could soon be living in London.
A feasibility study is underway to determine whether these huge birds could once again breed in the capital. Citizen Zoo will investigate which measures are needed to make London mor.