PEOPLE in this country are not unaware of the terrible cruelty meted out to badgers in the name of 'sport' by a section of low lifes in the community.

Sick minds deliberately dig out, torture and then bait a badger to the death with dogs, just for the fun of it.

Badgers are also caught in illegal snares which tighten as the animal struggles to free itself causing a slow, painful, lingering death.

We are supposed to be a nation of animal lovers. We ought to do something to stop this horrific suffering. The Home Office doesn't consider badger cruelty a 'crime', so the cruelty and 'sport' goes unstopped.

I urge readers to write to their MPs, the Prime Minister and Home Secretary David Blunkett asking them to sign Early Day Motion 371 on this issue to get the law changed.

Mrs C A Ward,

Shipton Road, York.

Updated: 10:09 Wednesday, October 16, 2002