Brian May has said Queen will not play Glastonbury next year after clashing with the festival’s founder over the controversial badger cull.

The 72-year-old guitarist and animal rights campaigner rubbished claims that his band had been booked to headline Glastonbury’s 50th anniversary event next year.

Founder Michael Eavis, 84, who is also a dairy farmer, has called May a “danger to farming” and criticised him for his opposition to the badger cull, which is aimed at preventing the spread of bovine TB.

Last year, Eavis’s support for the cull prompted the Downton Abbey actor Peter Egan to call on music fans to boycott Glastonbury.

Speaking on BBC Radio 2 on Friday, May said Queen, who are touring with American Idol’s Adam Lambert providing the vocals, would not perform at Glastonbury in 2020 unless “things changed radically”.

Anyone who’s seen the aftermath of festivals will know that it can end up looking more like a rubbish tip than a celebration of music. 

About 23,500 tonnes of waste are produced each year at UK music festivals, according to Powerful Thinking – a group which looks at the festival industry. Roughly two thirds of that goes into landfill.

But Glastonbury co-organiser Emily Eavis hopes measures the team there has taken will inspire fans to be greener at this year’s event.

“Sustainability and the need to live in harmony with the land, has always been vital to Glastonbury Festival,” Emily told the Press Association.

Single-use plastic bottles have been banned on site, anyone going to the festival has been asked to asked to leave non-essentials at home and non-compostable plates, cups, straws aren’t allowed either.