:00:04. > :00:07.rail service such a good idea for Kent? I have to pay nearly four
:00:07. > :00:12.grand for the privilege of a journey that now takes 20 minutes
:00:12. > :00:16.longer than it used to. Amazing discoveries about the
:00:16. > :00:20.Romans in the south-east. 1,800 years ago, this would have been
:00:20. > :00:23.like Ironbridge, with forges bashing away and furnaces firing.
:00:23. > :00:27.This was the industrial heartland of England at the height of the
:00:27. > :00:31.Roman Empire. And should we start culling badgers
:00:32. > :00:37.in Sussex? We are looking for an answer and an answer which is going
:00:37. > :00:42.to work, not just to kill because we have got to do something.
:00:42. > :00:52.I'm Natalie Graham with untold stories, closer to home. From all
:00:52. > :01:02.
:01:02. > :01:07.round Kent and Sussex, this is Hello, tonight I'm in Pevensey,
:01:07. > :01:09.where the walls built by the Romans are still standing. Later on, I'll
:01:09. > :01:14.be finding out more about the lesser-known history of their time
:01:14. > :01:16.in Sussex. But first, after a lot of e-mails
:01:16. > :01:26.and calls from disgruntled rail passengers in Kent, Vince Rogers
:01:26. > :01:47.
:01:47. > :01:50.The railway is already, relatively, a rich man's toy. That's according
:01:50. > :01:56.to the former Transport Secretary Phillip Hammond, when he was on the
:01:56. > :02:00.subject of high-speed trains. There is currently only one high-
:02:00. > :02:04.speed service in the country and it runs in Kent. High-Speed 1 itself,
:02:04. > :02:10.the infrastructure, is a superb piece of rail engineering. So we
:02:10. > :02:13.strongly support High-Speed 1. is the name of the new railway line
:02:13. > :02:19.from St Pancras down to the Channel Tunnel - just like M1 is the name
:02:19. > :02:23.of the motorway. High Speed is the name of the rail service which runs
:02:23. > :02:29.at a high speed on HS1, but runs at the same speed as normal trains
:02:29. > :02:32.when they turn off on to normal lines. You can't deny it's a
:02:32. > :02:40.fantastic piece of infrastructure - if you live in Ashford and you want
:02:40. > :02:44.to get to London in 35 minutes. But some other commuters in other parts
:02:45. > :02:50.of the network are not happy. They say some kind of strange paradox
:02:50. > :02:54.has happened. The fast trains have made things slower.
:02:54. > :02:57.If you live on the north Kent line and you want to travel to London,
:02:57. > :03:05.you've got a choice of two types of train. The normal classic train,
:03:05. > :03:08.and, since December 2009, the new, more expensive High Speed.
:03:08. > :03:12.So you're saying that the very fact that the high-speed train exists,
:03:13. > :03:20.that is slowing down everything else? Absolutely.
:03:20. > :03:30.Herne Bay in North Kent. Many people commute from here to London.
:03:30. > :03:33.One of them lives here - John Nicholson. Because of that extra
:03:33. > :03:43.journey time sitting on the train, just thinking what I could be doing
:03:43. > :03:53.
:03:53. > :03:56.Every morning, John sets off to get He travels on the ordinary train.
:03:56. > :04:03.But since the high-speed was introduced in December 2009, his
:04:03. > :04:06.train has slowed down. I have to pay nearly four grand for the
:04:06. > :04:11.privilege of a journey that now takes 20 minutes longer than it
:04:11. > :04:17.used to. And fellow Herne Bay train user Peter Lee has represented
:04:17. > :04:22.commuters for 30 years. He says the high-speed has done one thing to
:04:22. > :04:26.the classic train service. It has spoilt it. So we do feel hard done
:04:26. > :04:29.by. The main problem is that when the high-speed service was
:04:29. > :04:32.introduced, some of the stopping services from Victoria to Faversham
:04:32. > :04:35.were withdrawn, and that has meant the mainline trains are making more
:04:35. > :04:38.stops and the journey times are extended.
:04:38. > :04:48.Remember, this isn't about punctuality. They are saying that
:04:48. > :04:51.
:04:51. > :04:58.the journey times, according to the Meanwhile, over in Westminster,
:04:58. > :05:04.there are also complaints about the high-speed service. Roger Gale, the
:05:04. > :05:07.Member of Parliament for North Thanet, is not a fan of the train.
:05:07. > :05:10.The classic services that run into central London are slower as a
:05:10. > :05:16.result of the high-speed one, because they clear a path for the
:05:16. > :05:22.high-speed train. Where is the benefit of that? So this calls for
:05:22. > :05:28.a trip to St Pancras... ..to meet Vince Lucas, who is the
:05:28. > :05:33.Service Delivery Director of Southeastern. He says yes, some
:05:33. > :05:36.trains are slower, but only some. Some of the off-peak trains that
:05:36. > :05:42.stop at all stations stop at more stations now, because we changed
:05:42. > :05:46.the stopping patterns on the trains. On the peak trains, some of the
:05:46. > :05:49.peak trains into Cannon Street, that a lot of people go in to the
:05:49. > :05:53.City on, some of those are a bit faster and some are a bit slower
:05:53. > :05:56.than 2008. Obviously we have looked at it all as well. But the
:05:56. > :06:03.complaining commuters have dug out timetables going back to 1912 and
:06:03. > :06:06.crunched the numbers to show that average journey times are going up.
:06:06. > :06:10.If you look at this one, for example, this is Faversham to
:06:10. > :06:13.Victoria in the UPOV peak. As you can see, it improved journey times
:06:13. > :06:17.through from 1976-2009 and then with the introduction of a high-
:06:17. > :06:26.speed train, we go up six or seven minutes on the journey time to
:06:26. > :06:30.Victoria. -- up-off peak. Back at St Pancras, I showed the graphs to
:06:30. > :06:33.Vince Lucas of Southeastern. It is sort of going up like that,
:06:33. > :06:36.it should be going down. Since privatisation, there has been more
:06:36. > :06:39.and more trains put on both to encourage demand and to meet that
:06:39. > :06:42.demand, and when you have more trains on a network with the
:06:42. > :06:46.infrastructure staying the same, to get them all in, they are going to
:06:46. > :06:49.take a bit longer. You are using the capacity better. It is a bit
:06:49. > :06:52.like the M25. When it is really busy, it goes to variable speeds
:06:52. > :06:56.and drops the speeds down to get more cars through. The trains are
:06:56. > :06:59.the same. What you are seeing is the result of more people than ever
:06:59. > :07:02.using the railways. They are saying the trains are going slower and
:07:03. > :07:07.they are. Some are slower, you could produce a different graph
:07:07. > :07:11.that shows us something else. With any set of statistics like that,
:07:11. > :07:14.you could show all sorts of things. We wanted to film John Nicholson on
:07:14. > :07:24.his commute to work, but Southeastern wouldn't let us.
:07:24. > :07:29.
:07:29. > :07:32.However, instead, we can show you If you were allowed to film my
:07:32. > :07:37.journey, you would appreciate that it is an extra 15-20 minutes long
:07:37. > :07:39.each way and we are really not happy about that. The classic
:07:39. > :07:43.services have become horrendous since the high-speed train was
:07:43. > :07:45.introduced. Services have been axed, journey times have been increased
:07:45. > :07:55.and generally, conditions and services are getting worse and
:07:55. > :07:55.
:07:55. > :07:59.But surely, though, there's one obvious answer to John's problem?
:07:59. > :08:04.You want to get to the City quicker? Yes, we do. Why don't you
:08:04. > :08:09.get on a high-speed service? Because it goes to St Pancras.
:08:09. > :08:12.would rather go to the City, where he actually works. In any case, the
:08:12. > :08:17.high-speed is more expensive and, on top of that, Peter Lee says on
:08:17. > :08:21.the north Kent line, it's not any faster anyway. The high-speed train
:08:21. > :08:24.takes 68 minutes to go from Faversham to St Pancras. It is
:08:24. > :08:28.almost exactly the same time as the train took to go from Faversham to
:08:28. > :08:32.Victoria until it was changed in 2009, so there is no improvement in
:08:32. > :08:36.journey times at all into London. have some sympathy with that view.
:08:36. > :08:39.On the routes from Chatham to the Medway Towns, they stop at a lot of
:08:40. > :08:43.stations because people want to get on and they take quite a slow route
:08:43. > :08:46.from the Medway Towns to Gravesend to get to the high-speed line at
:08:46. > :08:49.Ebbsfleet. Before the line was built, everybody wanted the high-
:08:49. > :08:55.speed train. Even though everybody knew that the journey would be just
:08:55. > :08:59.as quick into London. Kent County Council is a big fan of the high-
:09:00. > :09:03.speed train but they agree there is a problem on the north Kent line.
:09:03. > :09:12.So they have made a suggestion to the Department for Transport,
:09:12. > :09:16.saying that a simple tweak of the timetable will sort it out.
:09:16. > :09:19.think what we can do is have a look at the whole timetable and take one
:09:19. > :09:21.of the two trains an hour and speed it up by missing some of the
:09:21. > :09:24.smaller stations. But Southeastern's Vince Lucas says
:09:24. > :09:28.tweak or no tweak, we shouldn't forget that Kent is the first in
:09:28. > :09:31.the country with a high-speed service. It is about the fast
:09:31. > :09:34.journey times but it is also about saying what a fantastic piece of
:09:34. > :09:37.infrastructure Kent has got and how that boosts the economy and growth
:09:37. > :09:47.in jobs. That's the important thing here.$$WHITE But there is no
:09:47. > :09:57.persuading John and his band of grip disgruntled passengers.
:09:57. > :10:04.
:10:04. > :10:10.They are convinced that high-speed Vince Rogers reporting.
:10:10. > :10:16.Coming up later: how do we stop the spread of TB from badgers to
:10:16. > :10:26.cattle? We're testing these cows for bovine TB. And if they have
:10:26. > :10:26.
:10:26. > :10:28.been exposed to TB, then they will Now, what do you call someone who
:10:28. > :10:34.spends thousands on specialised equipment and then months looking
:10:34. > :10:44.for something that might never have existed in the first place? I went
:10:44. > :10:44.
:10:44. > :10:54.They came, they saw, they did some fascinating geophysical surveys -
:10:54. > :10:57.and a spot of metal detecting, too. These guys are part of a new breed
:10:57. > :11:04.of archaeologists - amateurs who invest their own considerable time
:11:04. > :11:07.and money scouring the Sussex countryside. Thanks to the growing
:11:07. > :11:10.number of people willing to fork out for the necessary equipment,
:11:10. > :11:13.and the increasing opportunities to share information on the internet,
:11:13. > :11:19.important new discoveries are being made here in the South East by what
:11:19. > :11:22.you might call part-time time teams. Everyone here is a volunteer or a
:11:22. > :11:26.student. And this is how you learn - hands-on experience - and it's
:11:26. > :11:30.brilliant. It is something that everyone can get involved with,
:11:30. > :11:34.everyone can enjoy. It's our cultural heritage. The last person
:11:34. > :11:42.to touch that rock was a Roman, and me. OK. That's quite amazing, I
:11:42. > :11:45.Harry Cunningham's day job is running his own garden centre but
:11:45. > :11:51.when he's not selling plants, he's searching for Roman glass, coins,
:11:51. > :11:55.tiles and knives in the High Weald. This is the sort of stuff
:11:55. > :11:59.archaeologists dream of. So it's not the pile of rubbish it
:11:59. > :12:03.looks? No, it certainly isn't. Harry's found all this in an area
:12:03. > :12:05.that's largely unexplored by professional archaeologists.
:12:05. > :12:07.much archaeology these days is developer-led, commercial, so it's
:12:07. > :12:09.archaeology companies which are paid by the big developing
:12:09. > :12:19.organisations, who are building houses, to do some archaeology
:12:19. > :12:22.before they start building. Here, we're in an area of outstanding
:12:23. > :12:25.natural beauty, so there's not much building going on. And that's not
:12:25. > :12:32.the only reason professional archaeologists steer clear of the
:12:32. > :12:34.Weald. It's thick clay, which is difficult to dig. It's a very
:12:34. > :12:37.wooded, which means there are routes everywhere and it's
:12:37. > :12:40.difficult to find the archaeology. The clay is acidic, so it rots
:12:40. > :12:48.things very quickly and bodies disappear. So all the lovely things
:12:48. > :12:51.go. It's dirty, unrewarding work, in other words. Exactly. It sounds
:12:51. > :12:55.to me like the professionals are being very sensible in avoiding
:12:55. > :12:58.this area altogether. But all these factors make it prime territory for
:12:58. > :13:06.people like Harry. It's great for the amateur archaeologist, because
:13:06. > :13:09.it hasn't been looked at very well at all. The whole of the Weald area.
:13:09. > :13:13.You don't find villas with the gold and the silver, but what you do
:13:13. > :13:20.find is far more exciting. You see the proof of everyday living, in an
:13:20. > :13:23.area which used to be solid forest. And the more we look, the more
:13:23. > :13:26.we're finding. And what they're finding in the leafy, rolling
:13:26. > :13:31.countryside of the Weald is an incredible amount of evidence of
:13:31. > :13:35.huge-scale industrial activity. The Romans didn't just come here in
:13:35. > :13:38.43AD to conquer. The Romans came here to the South
:13:38. > :13:43.East of England because they needed something vital to their empire,
:13:43. > :13:49.and they knew they could find it right here. They came for the iron
:13:49. > :13:52.of Sussex and Kent. The Roman Empire needed endless supplies of
:13:52. > :13:55.it - for weapons, for tools, even nails for building. But to turn
:13:55. > :13:58.iron-rich Wealden rock into metal, you need temperatures of 1,000
:13:58. > :14:07.degrees, so not only did they dig up the rock, they chopped down the
:14:07. > :14:10.forest to feed hundreds of furnaces. The Romans stripped the land bare.
:14:10. > :14:13.They turned all this into an industrial wasteland. Where we have
:14:13. > :14:19.fields today, there would once have been ancient woodland, and where we
:14:19. > :14:26.have trees, well, that's often regrowth over disused iron pits.
:14:26. > :14:29.And almost all of this land is uncharted territory. So that's what
:14:29. > :14:31.David Staveley is putting right in his spare time. This particular
:14:31. > :14:36.piece of kit, a magnetic field gradiometer, cost David more than
:14:36. > :14:42.�15,000. It paints a picture of what's under the surface of the
:14:42. > :14:45.earth and it's particularly good at finding Roman remains.
:14:45. > :14:52.What have you found? New roads, new settlements, new iron working sites,
:14:52. > :14:55.so yes a lot of work has been done there. Under this hill near
:14:55. > :15:00.Etchingham, David has mapped a large Roman settlement that's been
:15:00. > :15:08.dated to 150AD. The height of the Roman iron industry of the Weald.
:15:08. > :15:11.And he's convinced there's much more to be discovered. So the more
:15:11. > :15:16.you do, the more you're getting into this? Absolutely, I'm obsessed.
:15:17. > :15:20.I'm out most weekends. I won't be giving this up any time soon.
:15:20. > :15:24.Down the road at Barcombe near Lewes is another site where David
:15:24. > :15:26.did the geophysics. Here on what appears to be the edge of the vast
:15:26. > :15:32.Imperial iron-working estate, David Rudling of Sussex University is
:15:32. > :15:36.leading a legion of students and volunteers. They've already found a
:15:36. > :15:39.villa and now they're busy uncovering a large Roman bath-house.
:15:39. > :15:42.It is a massive complex, and we don't quite know really what was
:15:42. > :15:45.going on here. It's huge, this bath-house, really enormous, so
:15:45. > :15:48.bigger than an estate bath-house would be normally. Maybe this was
:15:48. > :15:57.used as an estate baths, or possibly for a wider audience or
:15:57. > :16:00.wider clientele. We know that further up the River Ouse there are
:16:00. > :16:03.iron working sites, so maybe this was used by people working there
:16:03. > :16:10.and some of the transportation people involved on the river, as
:16:10. > :16:15.well. Enthusiastic amateurs are always welcome to join digs like
:16:15. > :16:24.this. But even with no equipment at all, if you know where to look you
:16:24. > :16:30.can still easily find evidence of According to Dr Ed Jarzembowski, a
:16:30. > :16:33.good place to start is in the woods near Stonegate. We're in the bottom
:16:33. > :16:36.of a valley here on clay, surrounded by dense woodland, but
:16:36. > :16:43.1800 years ago this would have been like Ironbridge with forges banging
:16:43. > :16:53.away, furnaces firing. This was the industrial heartland of England at
:16:53. > :16:58.
:16:58. > :17:03.the height of the Roman Empire! Here it is. That is why the Romans
:17:03. > :17:06.invaded because out of this comes the iron to make metal. This is the
:17:06. > :17:11.slag from the ironworks. That is all that is left of the Roman
:17:11. > :17:15.Empire here. Tons and tons of the stuff. The reason we are standing
:17:15. > :17:18.knee-deep in the stream is because this is not an archaeological dig,
:17:18. > :17:26.but this string has been gently cutting into these ancient Roman
:17:26. > :17:29.layers, accumulating the stuff under the surface. -- of this
:17:29. > :17:32.of iron slag may be plentiful round here, but if look long and hard
:17:32. > :17:34.enough, there's a chance you might find something very rare indeed.
:17:34. > :17:37.Robin Hodgkinson of Eastbourne Metal Detecting Club has found,
:17:37. > :17:40.logged and reported plenty of Roman artefacts in his time. But he never
:17:40. > :17:50.expected to uncover a medallion in the High Weald of Sussex, dating
:17:50. > :17:52.
:17:52. > :17:56.from the time of the Emperor Antoninus Pius. At first, it looked
:17:56. > :18:01.like a coin but as soon as you handled it, the weight and size of
:18:01. > :18:10.it, we knew we had something completely different. It was just a
:18:10. > :18:16.case of going to the archaeologists, who took it to the British Museum.
:18:16. > :18:19.And some at the British Museum got out of their tree with it.
:18:19. > :18:22.that's because this medallion is so incredibly rare. Just one of four
:18:22. > :18:29.that have ever been found. other three are in the major
:18:29. > :18:33.museums in Milan, Paris and Vienna. And here we are, sitting in the
:18:33. > :18:36.woods in Sussex, with number four! Extraordinary! How it got here, of
:18:36. > :18:41.course, is a mystery. You must have asked yourself that question, a
:18:41. > :18:49.million times. It has got to be in connection with the iron industry.
:18:49. > :18:54.It was thought to be so good that the Emperor decided to... What's
:18:54. > :18:57.the word? Reward, I suppose. Reward, yes. Reward somebody. The discovery
:18:57. > :19:01.of this medallion here shows that our region was of vital importance
:19:01. > :19:04.to the Roman Empire. And it gives all amateur archaeologists a
:19:04. > :19:11.tantalising glimpse of what else might be out there and how finding
:19:11. > :19:16.it might change our perceptions of the past. It sounds silly to say it
:19:16. > :19:19.but you can change the course of history. If I did find a piece of
:19:19. > :19:23.iron that got identified as a manacle for a slave, it would
:19:23. > :19:26.change how we think about the iron industry in this country.
:19:26. > :19:29.that's why amateur archaeologists keep exploring the Weald. Because
:19:29. > :19:35.they're determined to unlock more secrets from the past, no matter
:19:35. > :19:38.how much it costs them or how long it takes. You're not going to give
:19:38. > :19:42.this up, then? No, no, I'll be going for this for
:19:42. > :19:46.a few more years, until my legs drop off. $$ WHITE No danger of
:19:46. > :19:50.this ending up on eBay? No, not a chance.
:19:50. > :20:00.And if you want to know more about Roman Britain, take a look at our
:20:00. > :20:04.
:20:04. > :20:07.Now, as an outbreak of TB in cattle approaches the South East, could
:20:07. > :20:17.Sussex be the perfect place to test out the culling badgers in our
:20:17. > :20:24.
:20:24. > :20:29.Badgers have a special place in many people's hearts - but they're
:20:29. > :20:34.not as harmless as you might think. They carry a disease that attacks
:20:34. > :20:39.cattle, called bovine tuberculosis. It can cause chronic wasting,
:20:39. > :20:45.debilitation and death. In fact, more than 25,000 cattle are
:20:45. > :20:50.slaughtered each year because of it. The disease can be passed to humans
:20:50. > :20:54.from animals - but cases are rare. Over the past 25 years, it's been
:20:54. > :20:58.spreading. So far, Sussex only has a few pockets of infection compared
:20:58. > :21:01.to places like the South West. At John Hook's farm in Oxfordshire,
:21:01. > :21:05.he's been getting a taste of what farmers in the South East are
:21:05. > :21:11.likely to face in the future. He's had to slaughter 127 of his herd
:21:11. > :21:16.after a TB outbreak on his farm. know all our cattle, and it's very
:21:16. > :21:22.upsetting to lose them in this way. Producing milk is seven days a week,
:21:22. > :21:24.365 days a year. To have it stopped for the best part of 12 months is
:21:24. > :21:31.devastating The government says badger culling could be the answer
:21:31. > :21:35.to stop the disease spreading. It's looking for areas to try it out.
:21:35. > :21:38.Roger Waters runs the cattle market in Hailsham. He wants action before
:21:38. > :21:43.the problem gets worse. definitely in favour of a cull if
:21:43. > :21:45.it's going to deal with TB in the area and the United Kingdom.
:21:45. > :21:51.Scientist Tim Roper from Sussex University has been studying
:21:51. > :21:55.badgers since the '80s. They are part of the cattle TB problem -
:21:55. > :22:01.there's no question about that. We know that from the culling trial
:22:01. > :22:05.that happened a few years ago. When badgers were culled, the rate of TB
:22:05. > :22:08.in cattle went down. A culling trial took place six years ago in
:22:08. > :22:12.Britain - an experiment where badgers were killed to look at how
:22:12. > :22:16.BTB spreads. But the animals involved started behaving in a
:22:16. > :22:19.unpredictable way - moving around and affecting results. The overall
:22:19. > :22:25.rate of TB did indeed go down, but just outside the culling areas it
:22:25. > :22:29.went up. Therefore the findings were open to interpretation. Now
:22:29. > :22:35.people are saying East Sussex is an ideal place to do another study to
:22:35. > :22:38.find out more about the phenomenon that surprised everyone. It was
:22:38. > :22:41.called the perturbation effect. Badgers are territorial - they
:22:41. > :22:44.stick to their own areas - but when disturbed by the cull, they spread
:22:44. > :22:51.into neighbouring zones and the number of infected cattle in those
:22:51. > :22:54.areas went up. Because badgers are social animals, they live in a
:22:54. > :22:59.fairly close-knit community and defend their own territory. Once
:22:59. > :23:02.they start getting culled, that's disrupted. You don't have as many
:23:02. > :23:09.badgers to maintain the borders, so other badgers will start coming in,
:23:09. > :23:12.and then you can get the disease being spread between the badgers.
:23:12. > :23:15.The government is concerned about badgers wandering, so it's looking
:23:15. > :23:20.for places to cull where badgers will find it difficult to spread
:23:20. > :23:24.out. That's why some say this area in East Sussex, between Eastbourne
:23:24. > :23:28.and Brighton, could be the ideal place for a cull. Hemmed in by a
:23:28. > :23:33.railway line, a river and the A27, its not impossible for badgers to
:23:33. > :23:36.cross, but it is more difficult. There are physical boundaries
:23:36. > :23:43.available - we have, obviously, the sea to the south, and the River
:23:43. > :23:47.Ouse is a good boundary. And the A27 and the Eastbourne-Brighton
:23:47. > :23:51.railway. And, of course, the area ticks another important box - it
:23:51. > :24:00.has a high incidence of bovine TB, which is why cows here have to be
:24:00. > :24:05.tested every year. If they have been exposed to TB, then they will
:24:05. > :24:08.get lumps on their skin and then they will have to be killed. Roger
:24:08. > :24:13.Waters says another reason why East Sussex would be a good place is
:24:13. > :24:18.that the infected area's small, making it easier to perform a trial.
:24:18. > :24:24.We have a small area here, which we could divorce away and have a cull
:24:24. > :24:31.and see if it is effective. it's not just a case of geography -
:24:32. > :24:37.to make a cull work, it will need landowners. Which is why farmer
:24:37. > :24:40.Stephen Carr has his doubts. of the land area within the cull
:24:40. > :24:43.area to be committed to the project. That could be very difficult, where
:24:43. > :24:46.you've got public bodies like water companies, or the National Trust,
:24:46. > :24:56.or other areas where they might be subject to people not wanting the
:24:56. > :24:58.
:24:58. > :25:02.cull to happen. But could there be another way of dealing with the
:25:02. > :25:06.problem? We've come to this farm in Buckinghamshire just as it's
:25:06. > :25:10.getting light to find out. The Badger Trust says vaccination is
:25:10. > :25:15.the answer. Injections are being mixed up as part of a pilot study
:25:15. > :25:18.here. And after a walk into a nearby woodland, it's not long till
:25:18. > :25:21.we see a rather bleary-eyed looking badger.
:25:21. > :25:23.With permission of a local farmer, volunteers here have been trapping
:25:23. > :25:32.badgers and injecting them with a vaccine to protect them against
:25:32. > :25:36.Simon Boulter is one of the volunteers. He says this study will
:25:36. > :25:40.help the trust see whether vaccination is viable. It can stop
:25:40. > :25:42.badgers from getting TB. The main job is that it actually reduces the
:25:42. > :25:44.severity of the infection - it captures them before they become
:25:44. > :25:51.too infectious, which means you're reducing badger-to-badger
:25:51. > :25:54.transmission of bovine TB. But it will take time for badgers to build
:25:54. > :26:04.up resistance to the disease - and not everyone's convinced it will
:26:04. > :26:06.
:26:06. > :26:09.work. Not all bad as can be trapped - some are just too shy - so if
:26:09. > :26:16.vaccination is going to be rolled out on a large-scale, we will have
:26:16. > :26:21.to have an oral vaccine. That would be something that could be put out
:26:21. > :26:23.in date for badgers to pick up as food. The Government says it won't
:26:23. > :26:26.consider vaccination without a cull, because there's not enough evidence
:26:26. > :26:29.it will work. Meanwhile the Badger Trust say alternatives must be
:26:29. > :26:32.explored properly and badgers are being unfairly blamed for spreading
:26:32. > :26:36.the disease. Other forms of wildlife certainly can carry TB -
:26:36. > :26:45.deer, rats and quite a lot of other mammals as well - but badgers are
:26:46. > :26:48.the ones that seem to be being blamed. Back In East Sussex, farmer
:26:48. > :26:58.Stephen Carr says a trial won't work and government plans won't
:26:58. > :27:03.make any difference. I'm afraid, it is very much at shutting the stable
:27:03. > :27:06.door after the horse has bolted. It is decades too late, really.
:27:06. > :27:12.National Farmers' Union says if we don't act now, the disease will
:27:12. > :27:17.continue to rise. We need a call to bring the disease under control.
:27:17. > :27:22.Without that, we believe that unless you deal with the problem in
:27:22. > :27:28.wildlife, you're not going to get on top of the problem. But the
:27:28. > :27:32.Badger Trust says it will fight any plans. We are looking for an answer
:27:32. > :27:38.that is going to work, not just to kill, because we have got to do
:27:38. > :27:42.something. It plans get the go- ahead, the badger call could go
:27:42. > :27:46.ahead as early as next May. It is clear the problem is having a
:27:46. > :27:50.devastating impact on some farmers and feelings are running high. But
:27:50. > :28:00.some say we are running out of time if we want to protect cattle and
:28:00. > :28:04.
:28:04. > :28:09.the countryside from bovine If you want any more information
:28:09. > :28:18.about the show, you can visit our Kent or Sussex website. You can
:28:18. > :28:24.also watch the programme again on the iPlayer. Coming up next week:
:28:24. > :28:32.We investigate exactly what is going on at Occupied Brighton.
:28:32. > :28:33.Why did you want to work in the funeral business? It is helping
:28:33. > :28:42.people. How funeral directing his becoming vicar real choice for
:28:42. > :28:47.young people in Kent. -- is becoming of the career choice.