Legal challenge against Badger cull licences in England
Legal challenge against Badger cull licences in England
Latest: Oct. 20, 2025
High Court rejects Natural England bid to hike up our legal costs
Press release from Wild Justice, Badger Trust & Leigh Day (20 Oct 2025)
High Court rejects Natural England bid to hike legal costs for campaigners challenging badger culling
An attempt by Natural Engla…
Read moreA joint legal challenge by wildlife groups Wild Justice and The Badger Trust against the granting of Badger culling licences in England has been given permission to be heard in the High Court for a full judicial review.
Our case challenges the legality of Natural England’s decision to issue 26 supplementary Badger cull licences in 2024, against the advice of its own Director of Science, who could find “no justification” for authorising further supplementary Badger culls because vaccination was a viable alternative.
However, Natural England went ahead and authorised the cull licences after Defra officials expressed concern that its relationship with the farming industry could suffer if cull licences weren’t granted.
We lodged an application for judicial review in August 2024 but in November 2024, The Hon. Mr Justice Sweeting refused our application. We lodged an appeal against that decision on 8 November 2024 and a hearing took place at the High Court yesterday (15 May 2025).
After listening to the arguments, The Hon. Mr Justice Fordham gave permission for our legal challenge to proceed on all three grounds, which are:
1. Natural England unlawfully exercised the statutory power to issue licences to kill Badgers for the improper purpose of maintaining farmers' confidence in the Secretary of State's policy, rather than for the narrower (and proper) purpose of "preventing the spread of disease" (Bovine Tuberculosis).
2. Natural England had considered arguments that were legally irrelevant to its decision on whether to issue the licences. These included the consequences of the decision for its relationships with Defra and the "farming community", and for its own budget and wellbeing of its staff.
3. Natural England failed to provide adequate and rational reasons as to why the licences should be issued after its Director of Science had advised that there was no scientific justification for issuing the licences.
The full judicial review hearing is expected later this year and there will be an interim hearing to deal with costs prior to that, following Natural England’s attempt to increase our costs should we lose the case, in what we perceive as an attempt to intimidate us from bringing the challenge (see here).
Although our case focuses on Badger cull licences that were issued in 2024, this legal challenge remains significant because (a) Government agencies need to be held to account for their actions and (b) we anticipate that Natural England will be making a decision imminently about 2025 supplementary Badger cull licences and it will have to think very carefully indeed now the legality of last year’s licences is in doubt.
This is a costly challenge - we have already spent a lot of time and money to get the case to this stage. However, we refuse to be intimidated because the needless slaughter of thousands more healthy Badgers, just to maintain Defra's relationship with farmers, is outrageous. We need to raise £52,486 to pay our lawyers, court costs, costs of research, Crowdjustice fees and Natural England's costs if we fail to win the legal argument.
Please help with a donation to enable us take this challenge all the way on behalf of Badgers, those charismatic and ecologically essential members of our fauna.
Thank you for any help you can give.
Thank you to all those who have already donated via our newsletter. We will shortly be transferring those donations to this crowdfunder.
If, for any unexpected reason, we raise more money than we need to fund this challenge then unspent funds will be retained by Crowdjustice and will be available for Wild Justice to use for other similar legal cases on behalf of UK wildlife.
Thank you, from Wild Justice and The Badger Trust.
(Badger photo by Chris Packham).
Wild Justice
Oct. 20, 2025
High Court rejects Natural England bid to hike up our legal costs
Press release from Wild Justice, Badger Trust & Leigh Day (20 Oct 2025)
High Court rejects Natural England bid to hike legal costs for campaigners challenging badger culling
An attempt by Natural England to hike campaigners’ legal costs to challenge badger culling licences has been blocked by the High Court.
The legal challenge, brought by wildlife groups Wild Justice and Badger Trust, opposes the granting of 26 culling licences by Natural England.
The challenge faced a potential stumbling block after Natural England applied to increase the limit on the groups’ adverse legal costs from the standard £10,000 for NGOs to £20,000 for Wild Justice and £30,000 for Badger Trust.
If Natural England had won, the legal challenge could have proved too expensive for the groups to bring. However, the High Court has now dismissed this request, meaning a cap of £10,000 will remain in place for both groups.
The 26 supplementary culling licences were granted for between June and November 2024, and allowed farmers to kill badgers during this period.
This decision to grant the licences was made against the advice of Natural England’s own scientists, with Badger Trust and Wild Justice contesting that the licences were granted unlawfully.
The groups argue that the licences were granted to maintain the confidence of the farming community rather than for the proper purpose of preventing the spread of disease, which Natural England’s director of science had concluded could be achieved via alternative methods such as a vaccine.
After launching their claim in August 2024, Badger Trust and Wild Justice were granted permission for the challenge to go ahead in May 2025 following a renewal hearing.
In August 2025, Natual England applied to the High Court to have the costs caps for both groups raised. The caps are provided for by the Aarhus Convention and cover all environmental claims - with costs for individual claimants initially capped at £5,000 and costs for NGOs capped at £10,000.
Natural England attempted to argue that Wild Justice and Badger Trust should dip into cash reserves in order to fund the legal claim, which both groups argued was not justified based on their income.
Wild Justice is not-for-profit organisation run by unpaid directors. Its funds tend to be spent quickly on daily running costs, campaigning expenses and legal challenges. The group’s only source of income is donations.
Badger Trust is also not-for-profit and relies on donations for its income as well. Its funds go towards wages, running costs and support to member groups. The Trust maintains a policy of following Charity Commission Guidance to have 12 months’ expenditure in reserve to ensure obligations are met should there be a drop in income.
After hearing arguments and witness statements, a judge opted to reject Natural England’s application to increase the costs cap for Wild Justice and Badger Trust. The judge’s reasoning for dismissing the application is set to follow in due course.
Caps of £10,000 will remain in place for both groups, with a substantive hearing for the claim itself due to take place on 16 and 17 December 2025.
Chris Packham, director of Wild Justice said:
“This was a calculated attempt to block grass roots groups from accessing environmental justice on account of affordability. Cynical, anti-democratic and bullying...Natural England should be ashamed of themselves”.
Bob Elliot, CEO of Wild Justice said:
“Natural England tried to price justice out of reach - and failed. This ruling is a clear reminder that public bodies cannot use financial intimidation to silence legitimate environmental challenge. Attempts to raise our costs cap were nothing more than an effort to shut the courtroom door on public scrutiny. Justice must be accessible, not auctioned to the highest bidder. The badgers may not have a voice in court, but we do, and we’ll keep using it to hold decision makers to account.”
Rosie Wood, chair of Badger Trust said:
“I don't like bullies at the best of times and this was a shameless attempt to bully us out of lawfully challenging Natural England's decision making. If a government body can force us to drop a case - even though a judge has already given permission for it to be heard in full - what sort of precedent would that set? We might be a very small charity, but badgers are a mercilessly persecuted native British animal - we will stand up for them at all times and we won't be intimidated."
Leigh Day solicitor Carol Day, who represents both groups, said:
“Our clients are pleased that this attempt by Natural England to increase the costs of the case, thereby making it prohibitively expensive, has been thrown out by the courts. Both claimants are small NGOs of modest means, which rely solely on fundraising for income. An increase in the costs cap would not only have disrupted this legal challenge, but also would have set a worrying precedent for other environmental claims.”
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