The government has strenuously denied allegations that around 50% of the dead badgers had in fact been purchased from a taxidermist just hours before the final figure was to be released
Environment Secretary Owen Paterson said yesterday that the failure to reach badger cull targets was due to the creatures’ propensity to move about, and hide underground, rather than sit very still in the open for 12 hours at a time waiting to be shot.
“It’s most unfair to blame us” said Paterson. “The government cannot be held responsible for the unsporting behaviour of badgers.
“It is not our fault if the little buggers won’t keep still. How can our highly trained marksmen be expected to hit something that moves about?”
It was originally planned that the pilot culls in Gloucestershire and Somerset would result in the deaths of ‘shitloads of badgers, like at least a bajillion’.
But in fact the final figure of successfully assassinated creatures was closer to 53, as that is, in fact, the number that have been shot.
Paterson said “The cull is still obviously a huge success. Especially as our revised figures now suggest that there probably aren’t more than 150 badgers in the whole of England.
“Maybe 160. Look, whatever figure sounds plausible, and makes me look good, just print that, ok?”
Marksman Jed Gunn said “They get up to really quite an impressive speed. They’re not at all like the pictures of badgers we practised on in the rifle range before the cull started. Those didn’t move. But these real ones, they’re really hard to hit. And they don’t have big red targets painted on their chests.
“It’s not my fault. No one told me they wouldn’t have big red targets painted on their chests.”
