Pre Weekend Musings From The Commute

It’s been a bit busy. Infact, its been unbelievably busy but I’m heading back on the train for the weekend. . Here are some thoughts on things that have been attracting my attention:

1) I got really excited about parliament’s badger vote (219/1 vote in favour of declaring it a total failure) until I realised that this vote was somehow irrelevant and all the pro badger cull people just didn’t both to show up. So, there is still every chance of another ludicrous slaughter of innocent animals. Anyone know how where I can find out how/if my MP voted? If he’s the 1 in favour then I’m not going to be sending him a badger onesie as a present.

2) Ireland are this year’s champions of northern hemisphere rugby. It was close but they gave BOD the retirement send off he deserves after a record 141 international caps. Shame on Gatland that’s not 142. No, I’m not going to let that pass.

3) Here’s a thought on replacing BOD. How about Tommy Bowe moving in to 13 as we seem to have plenty of cover on the wings. Then we could play with an interchangeable back four rather than a back three. Imagine the lines of running we could weave. Where is Joe Schmidt’s mobile number?

4) Welsh fans say they their team was shagged out after the Lions tour. It’s true the Welsh were the biggest contingent on tour but a fair few English and Irish too and even a Scot. So how come these three teams finished above Scotland, France and Italy?

5) If Scotland vote for independence in September’s referendum, do you think Putin would annexe them to Russia?

6) Perhaps, Salmond should think about that as a backup plan if he doesn’t get currency union with the UK or membership of the EU. It’s clear he’s desperate to be part of someone’s club.

7) Jo Wiley did 26hrs on a treadmill for Sports Relief. I love running but I’ve only ever done 2.5hrs on a treadmill. I’ve no idea how she did that. Text “Jo” to 70011 to contribute and show your support.

Have a good weekend, everyone.

A New Star For Irish Rugby

I promised myself my next blog would not be about badgers, just for a change. I love sports and particularly rugby and the Six Nations is a highlight of my calendar so here goes.

Sports stars come in all shapes and sizes. They flit into our consciousness during their prime and fade away again once their time is done. For the very few superstars, the special ones, their star continues to shine long after their playing days have gone. There is even a kind of sporting deification when a nickname which becomes synonymous with them is bestowed. “Beefy” will always be Botham to the cricket world. Recently the trend is to refer to them just by their initials. KP has been trending for a couple of weeks on social media and most people who follow the Premier League will know RVP or JT.

In Ireland, a special version of this exists where the initials spell a word through the inclusion of a letter O. It started with Brian O’Driscoll. Irish rugby fans delight in saying that in BOD we trust. For a while he stood alone but during a golden age for Irish rugby two more legends joined and we had ROG and POC to join BOD. in that glorious 2009 season they won the Six Nations and the first Grand Slam since 1948.

ROG has left now, gone to the afterlife in a commentary box. After a disastrous 2013 Six Nations tournament it seemed the golden age was over and Irish rugby would sink back into mediocrity. BOD is in his swansong season before a well earned retirement. His commitment never waivers but the body is injury prone now. A poor result against Australia in the autumn series did nothing to dispel the sense that a new coach could not halt our decline.

But then that stunning, unexpected and ultimately heartbreaking, gut-wrenching defeat to New Zealand kindled a faint hope. Two more matches in the Six Nations have helped flame that faint hope and expectations have grown. There is, of course, much to do still, starting with England in a fortnight, but the team is building a consistency to their performance we haven’t seen since 2009 and Joe Schmidt has brought a tactical side which is new. The foundation of this consistency, as always in rugby, is in the depths of “the breakdown”. Here the teams contest supremacy even where the all-seeing television cameras cannot see all. Here the heart of the team works together to keep the ball, to stop their opponents, to slow them down without over committing bodies and to ultimately win a turnover. Special warriors are needed to gain fractional but crucial advantage in the deepest recesses of the rucks and mauls and Ireland have found a new star.

A magical moment in any sports fan’s life has just taken place. Peter O’Mahony, I name you POM.

We Don’t Want A Sequel.

I’m delighted that the farcical badger culls in Somerset and Gloucestershire have finally been stopped and even more delighted that they failed in their attempts to slaughter sufficient numbers of innocent animals. But this is not over.

The culls were instigated by the government under intense lobbying from the NFU to address the spread of bovine TB. We can now expect the NFU to start “spinning” and justifying for wider culls in the future. In fact, this has already started.

According to the BBC report announcing the cancellation of the cull, Ian Johnson of the NFU is quoted as saying the badger cull was performed to “test humaneness, safety and efficacy.They’ve ticked at least two of those boxes. It remains to be seen as to the efficacy.” So, I guess the NFU considers the cull to have been at least 67% successful.

The NFU is a powerful lobbying group and many people believe they represent the interests of all farmers. In fact only 18% of farmers are members and they tend to be the wealthy land owners who are the Conservative party’s natural hunting ground for votes. So, there will be several more rounds to go, at least until the next election in 2015.

So lets get some things straight:

1) Any society which wants to test it’s humaneness by senseless slaughtering innocent animals needn’t bother. You’ve failed that test before you started.
2) The cull was not even remotely safe for badgers who died. It wasn’t safe for people protesting against the cull. I guess it was relatively safe for those pointing the gun on the basis that they were at least half competent. Then again, it would have been even safer to leave the guns at home. So, in my judgement we failed that one too.
3) DEFRA’s justification for the efficacy of a cull was based on bad science (see my previous post). Even so, they failed to kill the target number of badgers so we can presume they failed that one too.

In summary, we can award nul points to the trial.

We all want an effectively managed countryside and to curb this terrible disease. So it’s time we all got round the table again and built an effective strategy to combat it. In the long term this will be vaccination. With investment, we should be able to bring this forward. In the short term, we need a more practical solution than a sequel of this year please.

I might just send a copy of this to my MP and see if he’s starting to see sense.

Moving The Goalposts

So, the government hasn’t managed to kill enough badgers and want to extend the period of culling. Apparently it’s all the badgers fault as they moved the goalposts.

Let us stop pretending that this has anything to do with research. It would be funny if innocent animals were not the victim.

Badger Update

I did receive a reply from my MP to my letter.  He enclosed a document from DEFRA’s chief scientist.  This stated categorically that most scientists supported the cull based on the evidence but have not spoken out because they fear the backlash of public opinion.  It occured to me that this is one of the most crass assertions ever from a scientist. 

As I mentioned, I never expected my blogging career to start on this topic and my next post will be on something totally unrelated

Let’s start by stopping the badger cull

 I’ve never blogged before and I certainly didn’t expect that I would start with this subject.  However, the more I’ve thought about it, the more I realise how passionately I feel that the culling of badgers is simply wrong.  So, here goes …

From today, farmers in 2 areas of England will be permitted to shoot badgers in an attempt to control TB in cattle.  Some 5,000 badgers will be killed.  Bovine TB is a serious problem for the cattle industry and causes significant financial and personal hardship for the farmers affected by it.  Control of the disease is also expensive for the taxpayer with an average of £50m per year spent dealing with the problem over the last 10 years.  Finding new and more effective ways of addressing this issue is therefore rightly a priority.  However, the proposed badger cull is ill-thought out and has significant opposition from scientists.  I don’t believe it is the right course of action either for the following reasons:

• The cull is not expected to have a significant impact on bovine TB levels.  It has been suggested that a sustained cull of 70% of the badger population over a 5 year period will reduce TB levels by no more than 12-16% and it could be less.
• Previous randomised trials suggest that bovine TB levels in surrounding areas actually increases as a result of surviving badgers migrating out of the areas to establish new groups, taking TB with them.  This increase in surrounding bovine TB negates the minimal reduction in the area of culling.
• There is no firm evidence on the size of the role badgers play in the spread of bovine TB.  Although the disease may be spread badger-to-cattle through infected urine, the size of this role versus the size of cattle-to-cattle infection through urine is not proved.  To kill 70% of badgers when randomised surveys suggest that only 16% of badgers are infected is illogical under these circumstances.
• Defra (the government department which is responsible for overseeing the cull) will not review the badger cull for scientific evidence.  They will review only how humane the cull is and how effective it is in reducing badger populations by 70%.

• There is an efficient and cost effective alternative in the form of the BCG vaccination.  This has been trialled by a number of conservation groups already.  Allegations that the vaccination is not available are therefore disingenuous. 

Our countryside is one of our most important assets.  The protection of our rural heritage and environment are therefore equally as important as the issues of addressing bovine TB.  This cull will have a significantly negative impact on the environment without having a significantly positive impact on bovine TB.  Where realistic alternatives are available, the appropriate course of action must be to put resources into further scientific review rather than progressing with a drastic untested approach.

Shadow environment secretary Mary Creagh says “We need a science-led policy to manage cattle movements better and a vaccine to tackle TB in cattle.”  Instead, the government, backed by the NFU, are committed to a costly and senseless slaughter of animals without even the aim of collecting meaningful data collection to determine a better way forward in the future. 

There is still time to stop the cull.  On Wednesday, there will be a motion brought by Labour in the House of Commons opposing the planned cull.  The wording of the motion is “This House believes the badger cull should not go ahead.”  If you agree with my views, write to your MP and urge him to support the motion on Wednesday.