Last month we blogged about a pending judicial review of SNH’s decision to apply a three-year General Licence restriction order on Raeshaw Estate in the Scottish Borders for alleged raptor persecution crimes (see here).
We noted that SNH had temporarily suspended the GL restriction order until the judicial review hearing on 20th May.
Last week, the judicial review began at the Court of Session:
It was a starred motion (indicating that the motion was opposed and would require a a court appearance) that was only scheduled for 30 minutes. We’re not entirely sure about the judicial review process but we would guess, for an opposed motion, that a more substantive hearing will be required at a later date.
Meanwhile, SNH has updated its website with the following notice:
Whereas the temporary GL restriction on Raeshaw Estate was previously applied until 20th May, SNH has now applied a temporary restriction ‘until further notice’, which means that the Raeshaw Estate is free to carry out trapping activities under the General Licence.
In other words, the three-year GL restriction order that was applied to Raeshaw in November 2015 as a penalty for alleged raptor persecution offences is no longer in place. It’ll be interesting to see, if Raeshaw ‘loses’ the judicial review, whether all these lost months of trapping restrictions will be added to the GL restriction to ensure the estate serves a full three-year penalty.
Raptor Persecution UK 
Not directly relevant to this post, but I take it you’re aware that the European Commission has launched a legal challenge into the widespread failure by the Westminster Government and its agencies to challenge the lack of conservation of the upland Natura 2000 sites in England. It appears only to apply to England, but, provided England stays in the EU, it will be interesting to see how this pans out. One almost sympathises with English Nature for having to put together a defence to this.
Thanks, we didn’t know about that. Will look in to it. Cheers
Yet again we are faced with the farcical judicial system which gives the killers free rein to carry on their xxxxx xxxxx work due to these interminable ‘stoppages’.
[Ed: Two words edited out, Tony, to avoid a libel suit!]