The Scottish Parliament’s Rural Affairs & Islands Committee has announced the timetable for hearing stakeholder evidence as part of its Stage 1 scrutiny of the Wildlife & Muirburn (Scotland) Bill.
For new blog readers, this is the Bill that has been introduced by the Scottish Government in response to the recommendations made in the 2019 Werritty Review and is designed to bring in licensing for grouse moor management and attempt to put an end to the illegal killing of birds of prey on grouse moors.
The Committee hasn’t yet publicised who has been called to give evidence (other than the Scottish Government Bill Team on 31st May, members of the Werritty review group on 14th June and the Cabinet Secretary Mairi Gougeon on 28th June) but presumably other contributors have been selected from amongst those who submitted written evidence during the Committee’s recent review period (see here).
The evidence sessions will be held in public and will be live-streamed on the Scottish Parliament’s TV channel. Recordings will be available for those unable to watch live proceedings.
The first evidence session will take place this Wednesday (Scottish Government Bill Team, which includes Hugh Dignon, Head of Wildlife Management Unit, Leia Fitzgerald, Team Leader, Wildlife Legislation Team, Norman Munro, solicitor, and Sam Turner, Team Leader, Wildlife Management Team) and you’ll be able to watch it live here. (Search for the link to the Rural Affairs Committee).
UPDATE 13th June 2023: Transcript & video from first evidence session available here
Raptor Persecution UK 
Surely all the evidence was gathered by the Werritty team. It isn four years on and the persecution of our biurds of prey continues. It seems that the objective is procrastination, noit animal welfare.
The Werritty Review was about whether there was a need for grouse moor reform, whereas the evidence gathering by the Rural Affairs Committee is for views on the content of the Bill (e.g. whether the proposed legislation is considered comprehensive or contains gaping loopholes).
It’s a standard part of Parliamentary process. The Bill has to undergo Committee scrutiny as part of Stage 1 of that process. The Government can’t just draft a Bill and have it passed into legislation without proper scrutiny or debate (Stage 2).
Let us hope the committee hear evidence from someone/group(s) who will make the case for a DGS ban instead of the licensing sop. It was encouraging to read in the response summaries to the bill consultation stage folk calling for a ban, so I think it would be reasonable for some of those voices to be heard at the evidence stage. I’m not holding my breath though.