MARTIN Bell's hysterical letter ("Pet TB cases could be tip of iceberg", November 14) claims that Secretary of State Hilary Benn is "running scared of the Badger Trust".

We would be delighted if our tiny organisation had that kind of clout, but the fact is that the decision not to slaughter badgers has been made on the basis of the scientific evidence that it makes "no meaningful contribution" to bovine TB control. The quality of that evidence has been accepted by the world's scientific community.

Mr Bell claims a veterinary nurse and her dog acquired bovine TB from badger urine in her garden. In fact, no evidence has been published in support of this ludicrous hypothesis.

It is most unlikely that the nurse had face-to-face contact with an infected badger, but very likely that her proximity to infected cattle exposed her to the disease. The nature of the infection means she may have been infected years before the disease was detected.

Transmission through badger urine, via garden grass, is simply not feasible. It is also worth noting that, despite working closely with badgers for decades, no ecologists or conservation volunteers have been affected by bovine TB.

The recent perceived increase in the number of cats affected by bovine TB correlates with a new legal requirement to report the disease in all mammals. And, as the Veterinary Record confirms, cats get bovine TB from unpasteurised milk and the lymph nodes of infected rats – not from badgers, which they avoid.

The simple fact is that bovine TB is spread by cattle contact, both within the herd and through contact between herds across millions of inadequate field boundaries across the Westcountry. Other risks include sending cattle to county shows where they mix with other untested animals, and trading in calves which are exempt from pre-movement testing but are still capable of carrying the infection.

The situation is worsened because the TB test misses one in three infected cattle in the herd, leaving the disease to fester year on year. Badgers, sadly, are a scapegoat for a problem of farming's own making.

Trevor Lawson

For the Badger Trust

Access bargain

THE acceptance in the final paragraph of your leading article (November 4) that "funds must be found to properly maintain newly opened rights of way and access land" is to be welcomed.

IF one accepts the annual figure of £4 million mentioned in Matt Chorley's article in the same issue as being realistic for the upkeep of paths – and I do not necessarily suggest it is – such a figure amounts to only a few pence per head of population per year. Some of us would regard that as a bargain; money well spent. Even the much-criticised projected cost of introducing a coastal footpath around England amounts to less than £1 per person.

Some of us with a significant personal contribution to the national and local exchequer through direct and indirect taxation and council tax would welcome the greater part, if not all, of that contribution being spent on opening up the countryside to all and encouraging all, regardless of background, age or ethnicity, to enjoy it.

John Skinner

The Ramblers' Association Devon Area

Surplus cattle

WHILE I am an avid meat eater, I have no problem with people who choose to become vegetarian or vegan.

In fact my eldest daughter is a vegetarian who works in the meat industry.

I can't see a problem as long as the animals are treated well and dispatched quickly and humanely, as most of them are. What intrigues me is what do the vegans/vegetarians think would happen to all the cows, sheep, pigs and chickens if no-one ate them?

I hardly think anyone would want or could indeed afford to keep them just so that they'd look pretty in the fields!

Susan E Melley

St Columb

Walk of shame

THE latest wheeze by this "greed by example" Government that introduced 24-hour drinking is to ban happy hour in pubs and cheap alcohol in supermarkets, and have dedicated booze checkouts for us common folk to do the walk of shame.

Why do we put up with these preaching, self-serving, pocket- lining MPs who have 19 bars/restaurants in the Palace of Westminster, some open 24 hours a day and subsidised by the taxpayer to the tune of nearly £5 million?

Can't we sack more than half of them – although even 300 would be too many?

Oh no, sorry, the MPs would have to vote on that, and there would be more chance of turkeys voting for Christmas or Hell freezing over.

Roger Prescott

Plympton

Satisfactory service

I DISAGREE with the criticism of the Albert Hall Remembrance ceremony from your regular maverick correspondent from Port Isaac, Martin Bell.

I found it as traditional as always, with both innovative and topical items.

My war service was from 1939 to 1946 in various overseas countries, but I am content with the current musical style.

Tony Scawin

Wadebridge

Upside-down river

IN your preview of Long Way Down, which was broadcast on Sunday on BBC2, you referred to going down the Nile from north Africa to the Sudan.

Actually you are going up the Nile when travelling south.

Barry J Lennox

Kingsteignton