Brian May: The Badgers, the Farmers and Me is now available to watch on BBC iPlayer. 

Click here for more details and to watch.

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Documentary: Brian May- the farmers, the badgers and me. 

This new BBC documentary has been four years in the making and will outrage British viewers more than anything since the Post Office scandal was revealed.

The film represents 12 years of research at a practical level on cattle farms in the UK.  The new evidence presented is revolutionary and shocking - some will say heretical, and will eventually turn cattle farming practices upside down.  You will see here, first-hand, through the eyes of farmers themselves, the monumental failure of British authorities to deal with the terrible problem of Bovine TB in recent years, and the tragically wasteful resulting slaughter of both cows and badgers. 

This is the story of the 14-year journey of dedicated animal campaigner Brian May and Anne Brummer, CEO of May's Save-Me organisation, dedicated to giving British wild animals a voice. They embarked on their journey to discover the truth about bovine TB 14 years ago, when David Cameron revealed his intention to cull badgers if elected, in an attempt to curb bovine TB.  Along the way, rather than fight the farmers over the killing of badgers, May and Brummer effectively became farmers themselves, joining dairyman Robert Reid at Gatcombe Farm in Devon, and his visionary vet Dick Sibley.  Together they transformed his chronically infected herd of cattle into a healthy herd with certified TB-Free status.  And without killing a single badger. The revolutionary methods they evolved are now known as the Gatcombe Strategy.  

Over the last 12 years, almost a quarter of a million badgers have been slaughtered, based on the belief that they were spreading TB amongst cattle herds.  The heartbreaking testament of the farmers in this documentary is that this policy has failed them utterly.  Rates of infection and consequent numbers of cattle slaughtered are no better and in some areas worse than ever, following the cull.  And the results of our own experiment on Robert Reed's farm, as you will see, make it plain that blaming the badgers has been a wildly incorrect reading of the facts.  Of course, the slaughter of more than 230,000 badgers can now be seen even more clearly as a monstrous tragedy.  

How can this have been allowed to happen?  

In 2007, the famous RBCT report concluded that "Badgers can make no meaningful contribution to the control of TB in cattle".  Over the last 12 years, successive governments in collaboration with the National Farmers Union have clung to the idea that they know better know better.  They acted on the advice of a succession of papers published by a small group of scientists all claiming to have seen improvements in the welfare of cattle due to the culling program, or claiming that their modeling theoretically supported this idea. 

May and Brummer in the documentary present ample evidence to confidently assert that the very idea that badgers are part of the reinfection process is unsupportable. The advice given to the government has been based on bad science and amounts to an enormous red herring, standing in the way of finding a proper strategy to solve the problem. 

Who is telling the truth? The pro-culling movement has had it all their own way in the media for the past 12 years. This documentary is the first time that an alternative point of view has been presented to the public.  

The Gatcombe team not only solved the problem for the badgers but offer a blueprint for the true and speedy eradication of this disease in cattle.   In the 'Gatcombe Protocol' measures shown in this landmark film, farmers will glimpse hope – where all hope, among so many farming communities, has long been absent.

Speaking about the documentary, Sir Brian May said: “I don't blame people for being suspicious of me in the beginning, because, you know, I'm a guitarist. You know I'm a rock star. What am I doing?  Why would I have some contribution to make?

“I came in to save the badgers. I now realise that to save the badgers, you have to save everybody because it's a mess. It's a tragic human drama where people's hearts are broken, where animals are killed unnecessarily and the problem never gets solved”

Of course, some will question whether the conclusions of the documentary are wishful thinking or some kind of unsupported conspiracy theory. But history has shown that this is not the first time that conventional thinking on a rampant disease has been proved wrong.    

In the 19th century, Queen Victoria's physician single-handedly solved the problem of Cholera in humans by overturning the universally held view among learned men that Cholera was transmitted through the air. It's a very similar story to what you will see in this film. 

And a century before that, the British were still burning witches at the stake in the firm belief that they were responsible for our rural problems. 

The tragic badger cull has from the beginning been morally indefensible, but now this film boldly claims that science has made one of the biggest and most costly mistakes in recent times - hanging on to a policy that History will see as no more effective than condemning those unfortunate witches to the flames.

"It has been a long journey with a steep learning curve. We began by studying the pathogen M. bovis, tracing its transmission routes within this herd, observing its interactions with different cattle, and identifying when an animal was infectious or infected. We discovered that cattle can harbor M. bovis for years, even passing skin tests undetected. Our research demonstrates that it's possible to manage bovine TB within your herd without worrying about an infected badger population. It's shocking that over 230,000 badgers have been killed based on flawed science. The latest government model acknowledges that they have no clear understanding of badgers' impact on bovine TB. The cull has always been unscientific, ineffective, and cruel, failing farmers, cattle, and badgers every single day." Anne Brummer, CEO The Save Me Trust 

"Brian May: The Farmers, the Badgers, and Me" premieres at 9pm on BBC 2 and BBC Two Wales on 23rd August, and subsequently on BBC iPlayer.  

Please support the campaign to end the badger cull - sign the petition here.