Further to the news that Scotland’s new grouse moor licences have already been significantly weakened thanks to legal threats from the grouse shooting industry (see here, here, here and here for background), a blog reader wrote to the Scottish Government to express concern about the restriction in the area now covered by the licence.
This has changed from covering an entire grouse-shooting estate (as initially and reasonably interpreted by NatureScot) to just an unaccetably small part of an estate where red grouse are ‘shot or taken’, which effectively on a driven grouse moor could mean an area around a row of shooting butts.
That blog reader has kindly given permission to publish the response received from the Scottish Government’s Wildlife Management Unit:
It’s good to see a formal, public response from the Scottish Government who, up until now, has kept quiet since the news broke about the shambolic new licence condition a few weeks ago.
In its response, the Government uses the same phrasing that NatureScot did in terms of having an ‘expectation’ that the new licensed area would cover the full extent of the grouse moor. As I mentioned previously when NatureScot expressed the same ‘expectation’, I don’t believe this has any legal weight whatsoever because what matters here is the wording of the legislation, not what NatureScot or the Government ‘expects’ to happen.
The Government’s response also doubles down on NatureScot’s claim that the new condition is ‘legally robust‘ and acts as ‘a strong deterrent to wildlife crime‘.
The new condition may well be legally robust (although we don’t know that for sure because NatureScot is yet to release the legal advice it received prior to making this change to the licence) but what it most certainly isn’t is ‘a strong deterrent to wildlife crime‘. It’s nothing of the sort, for all the reasons I discussed here.
What is good about this response though is that the Government understands that the licensing scheme is not having ‘the intended effect‘ of the Scottish Parliament when the legislation was passed in March. That’s a start.
There’s a lot happening behind the scenes to address the ‘vast loophole‘ that’s been left by NatureScot’s flawed attempt at plugging the chasm. I can’t say anything further at the moment but rest assured this issue is receiving close attention from a number of influential and knowledgeable people.
UPDATE 24 January 2025: NatureScot capitulated on grouse moor licensing after legal threats by game-shooting industry (here)
UPDATE 10 February 2025: Parliamentary questions lodged on grouse moor licensing shambles in Scotland (here)
UPDATE 3 November 2025: Breaking news – Scottish Government commits to closing loophole on sabotaged grouse moor licences (here)
Raptor Persecution UK 
Unfortunately “specify the area” is the loophole that “intent” is in the Hunting with Hounds Act in England: big enough to drive a super-tanker through.
Yesterday I was ringing in a Wiltshire Wildlife Trust nature reserve, alongside a couple of Trust employees carrying out maintenance work. At approximately 11:20 the wood was invaded by about 40 foxhounds belonging to the Vale of the White Horse Hunt (this is not libellous, it is fact, after I left the wood I saw them again and there is no doubt and I have had it confirmed independently). There was no attempt to call them off until I started shouting, whereupon the horns started.
They will claim that they accidentally lost control and there was no “intent” – but who lays a trail that close to a nature reserve? I am sure that most illegally killed birds of prey will be found outside of the “expectation” area.
BAN all firearms to be used on the shooting estates without a SPECIAL PERMIT FOR 1 DAYS SHOOTING ONLY.
Make it so onerous and almost impossible to apply for and get and that will help stop this terrible slaughter of birds of prey.
Fight these wealthy pompous windbags with more money than sense using their own tactics against them.
stop them in their tracks
This legislation is neither ‘legally robust’ nor is it ‘a strong deterrent to wildlife crime’ so it will, no doubt, be business as usual for the deplorable and utterly abhorrent grouse, and any other bird, or wildlife, shoots that will take place with no-one able to monitor what they are up to at any time. All very well the Scottish Government being aware, so they say, but nothing will change for the better until these shoots are banned forever
Expectation!
A decade and half ago the Scottish Government pledged a commitment to dual the A9 by 2025. With minimal progress on that we all know they cannot be trusted.
When commitments/pledges aren’t kept, what chance have “expectations”!
Thanks for the update. Having been the victim of the wording in legal documents emanating from Government Departments – and the very strange ‘interpretations’ Government Departments sometimes put on them – nothing can be taken as read without proper legal advice, and even then you can still get screwed:-(
Since the legal ‘profession’ is subject to considerable bias I am ready for direct action. I am 85 but very fit – just point me in the right direction!!!!
Are we to assume that on shoot days the right to roam can be exercised without challenge anywhere outside the licensable area?
No! Sabs we’re given dispersal orders on open access land this Goriest 12 August!
“No! Sabs we’re given dispersal orders on open access land this Goriest 12 August!”
‘Outside the licensable area’ would be, would it not, the entire country not covered by the limited licenses issued by NatureScot for the shooting of Red Grouse and not exempted from the provisions of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003.
On which grounds was the right to roam denied anywhere outside of these limited shooting ‘licensable areas’ and otherwise exempt areas?
They are “aware” only because they were made aware…i.e. because they were caught out whistling and looking the other way with their hands in their pockets. Perhaps thinking – “great, we’ve made the noisy conservationist lobby pipe down a bit with this nice looking bit of legislation, and it hasn’t upset the landowners too much. It’s a win, win.” Personally I’m still looking towards Jim Fairlie to get involved. I believed in him and in the content of his speech at the close of the MSP voting. Was I wrong / naive to do that?
Did you get any progress on your FOI request and the NatureScot legal advice? Or is this the behind the scenes action you were referring to?