High Court judgment reaffirms costs cap protection for environmental claims
The High Court has reaffirmed costs cap protections for NGOs after blocking an attempt by Natural England to hike campaigners’ legal costs in a challenge against badger culling licences. In a comprehensive judgment handed down on 28 October 2025, the High Court stated it had “no hesitation” in dismissing Natural England’s application to more than […]
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 […]
Badger crowdfunder receives magnificent response
We recently launched a crowdfunder to support the legal challenge we are taking, in partnership with our friends at The Badger Trust, to challenge the supplementary Badger cull licences issued by Natural England (see here for background to the case). Our crowdfunding target is ambitious – £52,486 – because we need to cover the legal […]
Legal challenge against badger culling licences given green light to proceed
A legal challenge by wildlife groups The Badger Trust and Wild Justice against the granting of badger culling licences has been given permission to be heard in the High Court. The 26 supplementary licences were granted by Natural England against advice from its own scientists and allowed farmers to kill badgers between June and November […]
Natural England attacks the principles of the Aarhus Convention
Wild Justice and Badger Trust are mounting a legal challenge against the decision of Natural England (NE) to issue licences for Badger culling, made after pressure from the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) under the previous government. NE has asked the Court to increase the normal adverse cost cap (what you pay […]
Taking the next step with our badger cull challenge
Today we’ve announced we’re taking the next steps in our legal challenge of badger culls, alongside the Badger Trust. See the press release from our lawyers, Leigh Day, below. Wildlife groups Badger Trust and Wild Justice have begun a legal challenge after the government’s nature conservation agency Natural England issued additional badger culling licences against […]
Wild Justice & Badger Trust set to challenge supplementary Badger cull
Wild Justice and our friends at the Badger Trust have joined forces to send a formal legal letter to Natural England about its decision in May 2024 to grant nine new Supplementary Badger Cull licences and to authorise 17 existing licenses, which was contrary to the scientific advice of Natural England’s own Director of Science, […]
Badger consultation period – last minute extension
With our friends and colleagues at the Badger Trust we wrote to Defra about their consultation on 22 March – click here – and Defra told us that they would respond by Friday 19 April, ahead of the closing date of the consultation of Monday 22 April. Defra did indeed respond yesterday, our lawyers received […]
The confusing Defra Badger consultation
On Friday morning we asked you to spend about 20 minutes reviewing the current Defra Badger cull consultation. We are very grateful to 1082 of you who completed that task: 715 on Friday, 145 on Saturday, 108 on Sunday, 107 on Monday and 7 on Tuesday. Here are the summarised results which we will be […]
Badgers – we write to Defra
Statement by Badger Trust and Wild Justice We jointly instructed Leigh Day solicitors to send an urgent request to Defra on 22 March 2024 on their recently published consultation to evolve badger control policy and introduce additional cattle measures. We feel at the present time there is insufficient evidence about what is proposed and the […]
Wild Justice wins judicial review as Northern Ireland badger cull ruled unlawful
Press release from Leigh Day (25 October 2023) Northern Ireland badger cull by shooting ruled unlawful in High Court A decision to allow a cull of badgers in Northern Ireland by shooting has been ruled unlawful in the High Court. In a judgment handed down in Belfast this morning, Wednesday 25 October 2023, it was […]
New report on wildlife crime reveals lack of progress by Government
Wildlife & Countryside LINK, a coalition of 67 wildlife organisations, including Wild Justice, has today published its 6th annual report on wildlife crime. The report, covering the year 2021, reveals that wildlife crime has soared and the Government has made little progress on tackling it. The wildlife crimes covered in this report cover a range […]