The government is 'strongly minded' to introduce badger culls assuming further consultation confirms the policy would help eradicate bovine tuberculosis and be carried out as humanely as possible.,The announcement was made on Tuesday by environment secretary Caroline Spelman MP who said trials next year in hotspots such as the south west would need to be backed by tighter farm biosecurity and measures to deal with infected cattle.,According to Mrs Spelman nearly 25,000 cattle in England were slaughtered at a cost of £90 million last year because of bovine TB, 5,653 of those in Devon.,In south west England 23 per cent of dairy farms were affected.,'This terrible disease is getting worse and we've got to deal with the devastating impact it has on farmers and rural communities,' she said.,'A usable and approved cattle vaccine and oral badger vaccine are much further away than we thought and we can't say with any certainty if and when they will be ready.',Mrs Spelman acknowledged that not everyone would welcome the news.,'I wish there was some other practical way of dealing with this but we can't escape the fact that the evidence supports the case for a controlled reduction of the badger population in areas worst affected by bovine TB.,'I'm strongly minded to allow controlled culling, carried out by groups of farmers and landowners, as part of a science-led and carefully managed policy of badger control.,'If culling is ultimately authorised we will look to the farmers involved to show that they take their responsibility very seriously and that they are committed to delivering culling effectively and humanely.',Jan Curtis, of the Devon Badger Trust, was appalled.,'In recent decades we've culled 59,000 badgers but the problem is still here, why should it work this time?' she said.,'Why point the figure at badgers? Seventeen per cent of new TB cases are detected only at the abattoir as TB tests for cattle are only 80 per cent accurate meaning there are animals in the system spreading the disease.,'The case that badgers are the source of TB has not been proved.',NFU South West spokesman David George took a different view and said although the government had yet to decide where trials might take place he would be surprised if Devon wasn't included.,'I think what the government has announced is the best we could have expected,' he said.,'We think this is pretty positive, something needed to be done.',Consultation is to run until September 20, visit http://www.defra.gov.uk">www.defra.gov.uk for details.