WITH a badger cull in Gloucestershire looming, the number of people prosecuted for cruelty to the animals has almost doubled in five years.
In 2007 30 people were prosecuted in magistrates courts under the Protection of Badgers Act and by 2011 that figure had risen to 58 nationally, a parliamentary question revealed.
The number prosecuted for crimes such as badger baiting has increased each year with only a slight drop in 2010, to 48 from 50 in 2009, bucking the rising trend of cruelty cases.
Labour has raised concerns that some campaigning in support of badger culling, which has culminated in the Government giving the go-ahead for two trial culls this summer, could be contributing to cruelty against the animals.
The Government plans to cull 70 per cent of all badgers in west Gloucestershire starting in June, with the aim of reducing the spread of bovine TB in cattle.
Labour MP Diane Abbott, who obtained the figures, said the rise in numbers is "alarming" because she believes "this kind of cruelty is barbaric".
