Further to last week’s news that Scottish gamekeeper and convicted sex offender Russell Mason had pleaded guilty to battering a trapped Goshawk to death on a shooting estate in Perthshire, in addition to firearms offences (see here), I’ve been looking to see how the game-shooting industry has responded to this latest conviction of a member of its community.
You’ll recall that this is the game-shooting industry whose organisations routinely state they have a ‘zero tolerance’ policy towards raptor persecution, and many of them are members of the Partnership for Action Against Wildlife Crime (PAW) Raptor Group, in which case you’d think they’d be quick to condemn this latest crime, and reassure the public that if Mason and/or the estate was a member of any of these organisations they’ve now been expelled, right?
Six days on from Mason’s conviction, here’s how those shooting organisations have responded to the news:
Scottish Gamekeepers Association – silence
Scottish Land & Estates – silence
Scottish Association for Country Sports – silence
British Association for Shooting & Conservation – silence
Countryside Alliance – silence
Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust – silence
Perhaps they’re all waiting for Mason to be sentenced next month before they denounce his criminal activities? Although I can’t think of any reasonable argument for a delay.
Or perhaps they’ll wait for the inevitable public revulsion when the RSPB publishes the video nasty showing Mason bludgeoning the Goshawk to death, before they bother to comment?
Their current collective silence speaks volumes.
Raptor Persecution UK 
Their silence speaks volumes
Now there’s a surprise, NOT. As others have implied it speaks volumes and the most generous conclusion is they still all have their heads in the sand or their own fundaments. Less generous, they know full well and hope it will go away. The stupid thing is that in the long run they are condemned by it and will, along with their so called sport pay, hopefully the ultimate price——-Oblivion.
They are simply perpetuating the pretence that such things do not happen. Ignore it and it will go away.
They’ll be far too busy trying to dig up dirt on the RSPB instead, for having the audacity to catch a criminal
No mention of the case on the Tayside and Central Scotland Moorland Group page on Facebook either. But that is no surprise at all. Although IMO as this is the highly likely the same Russell Mason that co-signed (under the heading of the aforementioned Moorland Group) the letter of support for the continuation of snaring to the convenor of the Scottish Parliament Rural Committee, you might think the Moorland Group would have something to say about the fact that one of their own (I’m assuming there’s not another keeper in that region with the same name?) – has been convicted for a crime that they are supposed to be hard against. Then again, a quick scan of the other gamekeeper signatories on that letter shows at least another two wildlife crime convicts from among the Scottish Moorland Groups, and another name of interest to those that have followed these cases across the UK down the years. To me one of two conclusions, can be drawn – one, pure coincidence that these keepers have the same names but are different people altogether, two – the Moorland Groups don’t give a f–k and prefer to just churn out rehashes of same themes e.g. curlews, black grouse and keepers as all round “rural community caped-crusader” etc, etc.
Suggests that this is an industry that believes it is dependent on killing birds of prey (crime), and has no interest in trying an alternative approach.
I wonder whether each was waiting for one of the others to comment, so they could assess the public’s response before they themselves reacted openly.
An old saying comes to mind where the xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx are concerned, “there but for the grace of god go I”.