DEFRA’s response to Ban Driven Grouse Shooting petition

Late last week DEFRA provided its response to Gavin Gamble’s e-petition calling for a ban on driven grouse shooting, after the petition reached 10,000 signatures.

DEFRA’s response was entirely predictable and we have no intention of spending time on a detailed analysis of its complacency and denial; Mark Avery has already covered this well (see here, here, here).

Instead we wanted to pick up on just a couple of things that were mentioned, to set the groundwork for two forthcoming blogs.

First of all the Raptor Persecution Priority Delivery Group (RPPDG). This cumbersomely-named group is basically the English/Welsh version of the PAW Scotland Raptor Group – just another charade of partnership-working, dominated by pro-gameshooting organisations such as the Moorland Association, National Gamekeepers Organisation, Countryside Alliance, BASC but also involves others such as the RSPB, Natural England, DEFRA. The DEFRA response to Gavin’s e-petition gives a nod to the RPPDG and claims the group is “working on developing tools to help tackle raptor persecution crimes“.

Part of the RPPDG’s remit is to provide publicity about raptor persecution ‘in order to build trust and transparency’. However, as far as we’re aware, at least in recent years, this group hasn’t provided ANY publicity for ANY raptor persecution crime.

Back in 2013 the group did publish a raptor poisoning map covering the period 2007-2011 (see here). Since then, this ‘delivery group’ has delivered bugger all. Although according to DEFRA’s Hen Harrier Action Plan, “the RPPDG have been publishing information on raptor poisoning since Feb 2013 and this is updated annually“. That was a lie – the group hasn’t published any information since that 2007-2011 poisoning map.

We’ll be returning to the subject of the RPPDG in another blog very soon, as we’ve got hold of some minutes from various RPPDG meetings that demonstrate how little it has achieved since 2013. We’ll be publishing those minutes for your entertainment.

The second thing we want to pick up on from DEFRA’s response to the e-petition is this paragraph:

‘The [Hen Harrier] Action Plan was developed with senior representatives from organisations including Natural England, the Moorland Association, the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation, the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, National Parks England and formerly the RSPB. These organisations, led by Natural England, will monitor activities and report annually on progress to the Defra Uplands Stakeholder Forum and the UK Tasking and Co-ordinating group for Wildlife Crime‘.

Wouldn’t it be useful to see a copy of the latest annual report on the progress being made on the 2016 Hen Harrier Action Plan? Remember, Natural England recently told blog reader Mike Whitehouse that “work on the six actions set out in the Joint Hen harrier Action Plan is progressing as expected“. What does “progressing as expected” actually mean?

Well, fortunately, we’ve managed to get hold of a copy of the most recent progress report (summer 2017), as submitted to the DEFRA Uplands Stakeholder Group, and it demonstrates very little progress indeed. Perhaps that’s what Natural England “expected“.

We’ll be publishing that report shortly.