Decision to not relocate badgers at Tweedmouth Cemetery ‘very frustrating'

The animals have been causing damage to the surface of graves and other grassed areas within Tweedmouth Cemetery with their foraging activity.

Council officers worked with ecology experts to carry out survey work in connection with an application to Natural England for a licence to relocate the badger setts – but it was turned down.

Natural England felt that the ‘exclusion of the badgers and closure of the two active setts would have a significant impact on the badgers and is not considered proportionate to the level of damage they are currently causing’.

County councillor Isabel Hunter, who represents Berwick West with Ord, has family buried in the cemetery, including her mother.

She said: “I’ve been dealing with badgers since I got re-elected last May. We don’t want them culled – in a nice world we would just pick them up and move them somewhere they can have a nice happy life.

“It’s very frustrating. I’ve got family members down there. I was there last summer and it was really nasty what they had done to one of the graves.

“If I had been a member of the family, I would have been really upset.

“The council leader, Glen Sanderson, has been very supportive and tried to give us as much help as he can. We’ve ticked every box and had the MP (Anne-Marie Trevelyan) involved, we’ve tried all the avenues we can.

“I just feel very frustrated, because it’s a very difficult one.”

Natural England did give the go-ahead for ‘badger-proof fencing’ to be installed. The council says it can be installed without causing “any significant problems” to the look of the cemetery.

Coun Hunter said: “I’m a bit unsure personally as to whether the fencing will stop the badgers, because they’re good tunnellers.

“I don’t know what it’s going to look like.

“I’m hoping they can put a green one in and it will be camouflaged.

“If that doesn’t work, we will then have to go back to Natural England and say ‘what are you going to come up with next’?”