Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:11 pm on 28 March 2023.
Diolch, Mabon, for those questions and points. I absolutely understand your opening remarks around the distress and stress caused, and I think you've just explained very clearly why we really all need to work together to ensure that we do realise our ambitions of having a TB-free Wales; at the very latest, 2041, but obviously, the earlier we can do it, the better it will be for us all.
I think the points you make around the letters being more empathetic is really important, because if you're stressed anyway and you receive a letter that you deem to be threatening or very unsympathetic, then that is only going to add to this distress. And at the workshop that we held last year at the Royal Welsh Show, I think that was one of the things that really came out, and I know we have been looking at that. As I said in my answer to Sam Kurtz, if you look at the letter that went to farmers in Anglesey, I think you can see an improvement there. But of course, we can always continue to improve, and you do have my commitment to looking at that. I think, by accepting the recommendations of the task and finish group on farmer engagement, what I wanted to do was really signal that Welsh Government is very committed to improving both face-to-face engagement, but also in correspondence in the way that you referred to, because I think that is the way to build up more trust, going forward, and to try and find that common ground, really.
As you said, unfortunately, we have seen a deteriorating situation on Anglesey after I identified that, and you will have heard me say in my initial statement that we had this survey undertaken on Holy Island to try and assess the levels of badger activity there. And then, we'll have a look at the findings from that and see what the next steps are. This is why informed purchasing is so important, and as you'll be aware from previous statements I've made, we gave significant funding to our markets to make sure that people did have that information that they needed to make those informed purchases. Biosecurity is very, very important as well, obviously.
You ask about badger culling, and it gives me the opportunity to say again that I have consistently ruled out an English-style widescale cull, and that now forms part of our programme for government—that commitment to not doing that. So, there will be no culling going forward, and badger vaccination has been part of our programme for many years, it predates me; I think it’s about 10 years now—sorry, the cattle vaccination. And when I spoke to academics last summer around the—. I think you referred, Sam Kurtz, to 10 years; it’s always been 10 years, 10 years, but I was told that, actually, this time, we definitely would have it within 10 years, and I hope it will be much sooner than that. That's why I was very disappointed that we didn't have any take-up of Welsh farmers to participate in the trial, because I think we can't just look to England to be doing this; we need to show that we're very keen to do it also.
You mentioned Pembrokeshire and the difficulties there. I do think it is important that our vets are very aware of everything, and again Dr Irvine will be continuing to work with our vets to make sure everybody has the information and the tools they need. And Pembrokeshire is something that we can look at as we procure the project. It's really important that we get it right. So, again, if there's anything that anyone thinks we need to look at, because we are tackling some really deep-seated levels of infection in parts of Pembrokeshire—everywhere else seemed to have an improving backdrop, but in Pembrokeshire it just seemed not to be improving, and in fact it was getting worse in many areas. So, that project to collaborate with industry, with our vets and with ourselves, is really important going forward. I do hope that we are able to learn from the project when it is up and running, and encourage other areas to look at what we're doing in Pembrokeshire and to have that similar engagement in other parts of Wales.