Press release from Scottish animal welfare charity and REVIVE coalition member, OneKind (22nd Aug 2023)
SCOTTISH ANIMAL WELFARE CHARITY AND PATRON CHRIS PACKHAM WELCOME SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT’S PLAN TO BAN SNARES
Today, the Scottish Government has announced its intention to ban the use of snares in Scotland, following decades of campaigning from Scottish animal welfare charity, OneKind.
OneKind strongly welcomes the Government’s proposal, which would put an end to the suffering of the wild, companion and farmed animals frequently trapped in cruel snares.
Snares are archaic traps used, in Scotland, primarily to protect birds such as grouse and pheasants from foxes, so there is a surplus of these birds for people to shoot for ‘leisure’. However, snares are indiscriminate and often trap, injure and kill a wide range of non-target species including deer, badgers, lambs and even companion animals, such as cats and dogs.
OneKind Director, Bob Elliot, says:
“We are delighted that today the Scottish Government has finally announced their intention to consign snares to Scotland’s history books. The regulation of snares has failed to protect animals from the extreme physical and mental suffering caused by these archaic devices. Furthermore, 76% of the Scottish public support a snaring ban on the use and sale of snares. We are pleased that the Scottish Government has listened to the voices of Scotland’s people.
Nothing short of a full ban will put an end to the suffering inflicted by snares. We urge the Scottish Government to make this ban watertight and not consider any exceptions to it.
OneKind has campaigned for decades for a full ban on snares in Scotland. Indeed, late last year, we marched down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile and rallied outside Parliament with hundreds of supporters, like-minded organisations, and MSPs, to call on the Scottish Government to introduce a snaring and real foxhunting ban. Now we have a commitment to ban the use of snares and legislation to end the ‘sport’ of foxhunting in Scotland.”
Bob added:
“Scotland’s wild animals are sadly often considered to as ‘pests’ or ‘vermin’ and thus are routinely persecuted. By proposing a snaring ban, the Scottish Government is helping send a message that wild animals deserve protection. Of course, a complete shift in mindset in how we view wild animals – as sentient individuals rather than ‘vermin’ – is desperately needed, but today’s announcement shows we’re heading in the right direction.”
OneKind’s Patron, Wildlife TV Presenter and Conservationist, Chris Packham, said:
“What excellent news, and a potential win for wildlife, today. These torture devices ought to have been banned a long time ago and I’m glad that the Scottish Government has finally recognised snares for the unacceptably cruel traps that they are.
Snares inflict so much suffering on wild animals and so I’m delighted that both the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government have taken a stand against snares. The UK Government must not lag behind.”
ENDS
The Scottish Government’s announcement can be read here.
There is now a six-week consultation, open now and running until 3rd October 2023 – you can participate by clicking here.
Raptor Persecution UK 
This is long overdue and hopefully will be accompanied by a ban on their sale at least in Scotland.
Let’s hope it will be enforced strongly given that the users of them are often very fixed in their attitudes and methods….
great news and I’ve already done the consultation given the shooting lobby organisations will flood it with negativity..
This is a bit odd. “Snares are banned” followed by a consultation? The consultation is also about extending the powers of the SSPCA.
Yet both of these issues were included in both of the consultations about the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill. Or, am I going mad?
How many consultations on the same issues are there going to be?
Is this a ‘Scottish’ thing? Have a consultation when the Government is ‘thinking about something’, and then have another one when they have thought a bit more about it? Maybe have another after that?
I don’t recall Westminster doing things like that? Have a consultation and then never hear another word, perhaps? But this…
I think the Scottish Government’s announcement should at least have explained why they think a second (a third, really!) consultation is required. Can we now expect that the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee will also come back for second opinions?
Maybe – I’m struggling to make sense of the process – the original consultations (which were limited to licensing) have come back with such a powerful voice for banning, has meant that they now want that specific option explicitly debated?
In which case, I wonder what the ‘change’ in ‘extending the powers of the SSPCA’ is really about?
And – possibly on the negative side – that the licensing of other traps has not given rise to a similar significant ‘write-in’ call for banning? What is happening about Glue traps?
Oh well… march them up the hill… and march them back up that hill…
I share your reservations Keith, more so with the thinly disguised pro-Tory faction seeking an internal coup xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx.
Fingers crossed all goes as planned regarding the banning of snares.
There is a ban on glue traps proposed in the Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill but in my opinion there are loopholes.
Below is the proposed legislation and amendments I proposed to the Committee to strengthen the legislation. You can write to the Committee and suggest your own amendments.
Wildlife Management suggestions
Part 1
Wildlife Management
Glue traps
S1 Offence of using glue trap
P1, S1(1)
Delete:
“It is an offence for a person, without reasonable excuse, to use a glue trap for the killing or taking any animal other than an invertebrate.”
Replace with:
“It is an offence for a person to use a glue trap for the killing, restraining or taking of any animal other than an invertebrate.”
_____
S2 Offence of purchasing glue trap
P2, S2
Delete title of:
“Offence of purchasing glue trap”
Replace with:
“Offences of purchasing, selling or owning a glue trap”
_____
P2, S2(1)
After S2(1): “It is an offence for a person, without reasonable excuse, to purchase (or otherwise acquire) a glue trap.”
Insert new sub-sections:
S2 “(2) It is an offence for a person to sell, barter, offer for sale, offer for hire, hire or loan, exchange ownership or offer for use a glue trap.
(3) It is an offence for a person, without reasonable excuse, to possess a glue trap.”
*This is intended to strengthen the new, proposed legislation on glue traps.
I wish now I’d not included “ the other than an invertebrate” bit so I’ll be writing back to the Committee myself!
The consultation on the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) discussed technical amendments arising from statutory reviews, prior to the results of a wider review of snaring conducted separately by the SG. It also said that “Depending on the outcome of the wider snaring review we may undertake further consultation on additional proposals …” So this is the further consultation and has to be done so the legislation is competent. Admittedly all very tortuous but finally to be welcomed!
Thanks to Libby and Lizzy. I guess(?) you are receiving a lot more relevant public information during this drawn-out process which I don’t normally receive in England?
I wasn’t really suspicious about it, George. More flummoxed. I can understand if process ambiguities need to be ironed-out, what with well-financed opposition predisposed to dragging the Scottish Government through the courts at any chink of an opportunity.
Completing the consultation is enough to see that they are already planning loopholes. Research my arse, how many foxes etc have died because of this clause. We need a total ban, not a Swiss cheese.
We need to flood this with our responses, don’t leave it to others. The shooters will be all over this.
Surely they mean “humane cable restraints”? Isn’t that the current xxxxx euphemism being used by the shooting industry and, to their eternal shame, GWCT?
GWCT have clearly demonstrated over recent years they have no shame, Simon
When I was a boy I snared rabbits like many other folk in the country for food. I stopped doing that when one night I walked into a fence wire at neck height which caught me by the throat.
Great news, but yes the ‘consultation’ part is a bit worrying we’ve been here before, the SGA did manage to get an exemption from Scotgov’s outlawing of dog tail docking which was a pisser – from what I’ve heard their dogs have a pretty miserable life already. I will definitely take part in the consultation, there was a paper published in the Scottish Ornithologist Club’s membership magazine round about 2000 detailing capercaillie’s susceptibility to sticking their heads in snares. The paper was co-written by a retired gamekeeper who had witnessed this and grew alarmed, but isn’t it interesting he didn’t go public until retirement. If I can find it I’ll post the details here.
Ban snares ! Ban grouse shooting, ban hunting ban the lot ! Let conscientious people who care about wildlife and the environment look after the land, not xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx