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Fundraising drive for RSPB’s Investigations Team

The RSPB’s Investigations Team has launched a fundraising drive to help support more staff and buy more specialist equipment for use in the front line against the raptor-killing criminals.

There doesn’t seem to be a set target as such, and donations can be either made as a one-off or as a monthly contribution.

The Team has produced some material to explain why funds are needed, including this website and this video:

For those of you wondering about the value of contributing, please be aware that these funds are specifically for the Investigations team and not for use by the wider organisation.

If you’re still wondering about the value of contributing, consider the following names and ask yourself if you’d have any clue about what’s been going on there without the tireless efforts of the Investigations team:

Bleasdale, Whernside, Mossdale, Stody, Glanusk, Leadhills, Millden, Glenogil, Moy, Invercauld, Denton, East Arkengarthdale, Swinton, Brewlands, Cabrach, Tillypronie, Invermark, Kildrummy, Buccleuch, Farr & Kyllachy, Glenbuchat, Raeshaw, Skibo, Clee Hill etc etc etc

Please support them if you can, HERE

Two ravens shot – police issue CCTV image of man of interest

Statement from Staffordshire Police:

CCTV APPEAL: DO YOU KNOW THIS MAN?

Staffordshire Police’s Rural and Wildlife Crime officers have released a CCTV image of a man they would like to talk to following the discovery of the bodies of two protected birds on Cannock Chase.

The two adult ravens were found at around 11.30am on Sunday 6 May by a passer by. The birds were still warm at the time they were discovered and further examination showed they had been shot.

Anyone who recognises the man in the images or who has any other information is asked to ring 101 quoting incident 298 of 6 May.

Alternatively, for guaranteed anonymity, please call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

ENDS

RSPB calls for independent review of grouse moor management in England

The RSPB is calling on the new Secretary of State for the Environment, Theresa Villiers, to instigate an independent review of grouse moor management in England, similar to the much-anticipated Werritty review which is about to report in Scotland.

The RSPB’s Conservation Director Martin Harper appears in an impassioned video, explaining that self-regulation has failed and why urgent reform is required. The RSPB continues to push for a licensing system to regulate grouse moor management and red grouse shooting:

Martin has also written a blog (here) where he discusses two aspects of grouse moor management (illegal raptor persecution and heather burning on peatlands) that have led to the RSPB’s renewed calls for reform.

Some believe that shoot and/or estate licensing won’t work, largely due to the same enforcement weaknesses that have led to the current failures in regulating this industry. Some believe that only a ban will suffice. What was fascinating to see at the Revive conference this weekend was a growing realisation amongst the public that no matter what their particular motivation for grouse moor reform (e.g. environmental, animal welfare or social injustice concerns), they are all inter-linked and they all lead to the same conclusion.

Whatever your view, something has to change and these calls are just going to keep getting louder and louder…….

Campaigners call for radical grouse moor reform at Perth conference

The Revive Coalition’s conference was a huge success at the weekend – many thanks to Max Wiszniewski, Revive’s Campaign Manager, who pulled it all together, and an incredibly engaged audience, who enthusiastically interacted with a number of expert discussion panels throughout the day.

Revive will be reporting separately on the conference so for now, here’s a report in yesterday’s Courier:

Hundreds of campaigners flooded into Perth Theatre on Saturday demanding radical reform of Scotland’s grouse moors.

The Revive Coalition, consisting of Common Weal, Raptor Persecution UK, Friends of the Earth Scotland, OneKind and League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) organised the inaugural event at the theatre’s Joan Knight Studio.

Sparked by the ongoing blight of illegal persecution of birds of prey across Scotland, the group are calling on stringent legal changes to grouse moors across the country.

The group believe that almost a fifth of Scotland is grouse moor, and have called on the wider “circle of destruction” to be reigned in.

Amongst the coalition’s demands are an end to government subsidies for grouse moors, fairer taxation, stricter policing and a requirement for full planning permission to build tracks on moorland.

Limitations on the amount of heather which can be burned and a ban on burning on peat reserves is also being sought by the group, along with bans on snares, medicating grouse.

TV conservationist Chris Packham addressed the audience with an video message before the speakers took to the stage.

With MSPs Alison Johnstone, Claudia Beamish and Andy Wightman all speaking at the event, the group already has plenty of political support.

Robbie Marsland, director of LACS, said: “It’s so much bigger than just the shooting of the birds. To make sure there are enough to shoot, you’re looking at a circle of destruction which includes unplanned tracks and roads which go across the moors, spoiling the countryside.

There’s also medicated grit trays which are supposed to control disease, but grouse pass on disease amongst themselves more frequently. This draws them together and they pass on the disease.

If you want to make sure there as as many grouse as possible, you get rid of everything which predates on them and their eggs or chicks. In effect, these foxes and crows and weasels are just animals.”

A reform is hoped would help clamp down on the number of birds of prey being killed or going missing over moorland, but Mr Marlsand’s organisation hopes that a reform could tackle wider issues relating to social justice and the environment.

Mr Marsland claimed that the grouse shooting industry is worth around £36m to Scotland, what he says is about the same annual income as two supermarkets, and employs less than 3,000 people with an average income of under £12,000.

Following this weekend’s event, Revive are looking to hold a parliamentary reception later in the year to further case.

ENDS

First Minister finally writes to 9 year old boy about golden eagle persecution

At the beginning of July the news emerged that two satellite-tagged golden eagles, named Adam and Charlie, had vanished from the same grouse moor, on the same morning, in highly suspicious circumstances (see here).

In response to this news, and prompted by children’s author Gill Lewis, quite a number of people drew pictures of golden eagles and sent them to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, urging her to finally take action against the grouse shooting industry. One of those people was a nine-year-old boy called Freddie Blackman, who drew this fantastic picture:

After almost a month of silence from the First Minister, not just about these suspiciously ‘missing’ eagles but also about a ‘missing’ hen harrier and two other hen harriers (here & here) that were found on grouse moors with illegal spring traps gripping their legs, Nicola Sturgeon has now finally responded to Freddie with this letter:

Nine-year-old Freddie seems a pretty savvy young man and is unlikely to be impressed with The First Minister’s suggestion that she doesn’t yet know why golden eagles and other raptors are ‘going missing or being hurt’ but that she’s waiting for a report from a ‘special group of people’ (Prof Werritty et al) to find out!

He’ll also be pretty unimpressed if he checks out the SNH website, as Ms Sturgeon suggests, to find out ‘what we are doing to protect wildlife in Scotland’. Er, here’s what you’re doing, Nicola – thinking about putting ravens on the General Licence so that gamekeepers and farmers can slaughter as many as they like, when they like, without any level of accountability whatsoever.

Freddie wasn’t the only one who wrote to the First Minister urging action against the grouse shooting industry. Andy Wightman MSP, the Scottish Parliament’s Golden Eagle Species Champion also wrote to Ms Sturgeon following the disappearance of Adam & Charlie. He told her it was ‘long past time for reviews and inquiries’ and he asked for some very specific action:

  1. Provide clear leadership in condemning these organised crimes;
  2. Commit to legislate to ban or to regulate driven grouse-shooting;
  3. Meet with me and others concerned with raptor conservation to discuss how your Government can take further action to eradicate wildlife crimes;
  4. Invite the Justice Secretary to convene a high-level task force of law enforcement officials to step up prevention and detection of wildlife crime and improve the admissibility of evidence in court.

The First Minister’s response to Andy’s letter? To ignore his specific requests for action and to delegate back to Environment Cabinet Secretary Roseanna Cunningham who simply regurgitated the standard response that’s been sent to all those who wrote to the Scottish Government about the ongoing persecution of raptors on Scottish grouse moors:

Without a shadow of doubt, the Scottish Government’s continued procrastination about dealing with the criminals within the grouse shooting industry will be high up on the agenda of many of us attending the Revive conference today.

Watch this space……

Revive Coalition hosts first conference on grouse moor reform

The Revive Coalition for grouse moor reform in Scotland will host its first national conference in Perth this weekend.

Entitled Wildlife, Land Reform and Environment, tickets sold out months ago, which is a good indicator of the level of public interest.

10.00 – 11.00: Registration

11.00 – 11.20:  Introduction from Revive Campaign Manager Max Wiszniewski

Presentation from Holly Gillibrand on the need to act for environment, wildlife and young people

11.20 – 12.45: Presentations and discussion panel on Raptor Persecution, Mountain Hares & Animal Welfare

Chair: Alison Johnstone MSP

Dr Ruth Tingay, Revive Director & Raptor Persecution UK

Bob Elliot, Revive Director & OneKind

Andrea Hudspeth, Scottish Raptor Study Group

Ian Thomson, RSPB Scotland

12.45 – 13.45: Lunch

13.45 – 14.45: Presentations and discussion panel on Environment and Landscape

Chair: Claudia Beamish MSP

Dr Richard Dixon, Revive Director & Friends of the Earth Scotland

Helen Todd, Ramblers Scotland

Beryl Leatherland, Scottish Wild Land Group

Peter Cairns, Scotland the Big Picture

14.45 – 15.15: Discussion panel, ‘Living with it Locally’

Chair: Max Wiszniewski

Julie Bell, SNP Councillor, Kirriemuir and Dean

Susan Mathews, Cairngorms resident

Steve Gardner, Common Weal Angus

15.15 – 16.05: Presentations and discussion panel on ‘Back to Life’

Chair: Libby Anderson, Policy Advisor to OneKind

Andy Wightman MSP

Máiri McFadyen, Fearann/Land project creative activist

Robin McAlpine, Revive Director & Common Weal

16.05 – 16.30: Closing statements

Robbie Marsland, Revive Director & League Against Cruel Sports Scotland

17.00: Conference ends

Prof Werritty slags off Chris Packham on Game Fair panel (not really)

For anyone wondering what’s happened to the elusive Professor Werritty and his report on grouse moor management and recommendations for reform, you need look no further than last weekend’s Game Fair.

According to Fieldsports Channel TV’s facebook page, Professor Werrity [sic] was on a panel slagging off Wild Justice along with Robin Page, Andrew Gilruth (GWCT) and host Charlie Jacoby, who had the nerve to say that Wild Justice Director Chris Packham “doesn’t want an honest debate” when Chris (and Mark Avery) had already agreed to be interviewed at the Game Fair but were banned at the last minute after BASC, GWCT and Countryside Alliance were scared of ‘violence from shooters‘ and/or scared of hearing the truth.

Of course, like many things that appear on Fieldsports Channel TV, it bears no resemblance to the truth whatsoever. Of course Professor Werritty wasn’t there on the panel – the third panelist was none other than Ian Gregory, the PR gun hired by wealthy grouse moor owners to smear the name of the RSPB via an outlet called You Forgot The Birds (YFTB, remember them?!).

We’ve written before about how difficult it is to distinguish between YFTB and GWCT, as both rely so much on propaganda and misrepresenting actual scientific evidence, but to confuse Ian Gregory with Professor Werritty is stretching things a fair bit!

It’s not clear why it happened but we did note Professor Werritty’s name on the lecture theatre schedule – perhaps he’d also been invited and then subsequently uninvited for his ‘extremist’ approach to scientific research, but someone forgot to blank out his name in their haste to remove Mark’s and Chris’s (zero marks for Tippexing skills, by the way).

[Photo: Ruth Tingay]

It’s interesting that the panel comprised two PR professionals and one old bloke who’s well known for his spiteful & persistent attacks on Chris via Twitter. This was billed as a ‘keynote debate’ on the grouse moor management review group (Prof Werritty’s work) but was nothing of the sort.

The ‘debate’ (it wasn’t a debate) was live-streamed and you can watch the last 20 minutes of it on FieldsportsChannel TV’s facebook page if you can suffer listening to those three for so long.

Since last weekend’s Game Fair, Charlie Jacoby has now been invited to this year’s BirdFair to interview the three Wild Justice Directors on stage in the main event marquee (Sat 17th Aug).

Mr Jacoby has apparently accepted.

Scottish Government’s response to ongoing illegal raptor persecution

Thanks to everyone who emailed First Minister Nicola Sturgeon following the recent raptor persecution atrocities that have been reported from a number of Scottish grouse moors ( a dead spring-trapped hen harrier found on a grouse moor in Perthshire (here), the suspicious disappearance, within a few hours of each other, of two satellite tagged golden eagles on another grouse moor in Perthshire (here), and another spring-trapped hen harrier found critically injured and distressed on a grouse moor in South Lanarkshire (here)).

After weeks of complete silence from Scottish Ministers (here, here, here), which, to be frank, has been utterly staggering and certainly not indicative of a Government ready to act, an impersonal, automated response letter is now being sent out to those who appealed for the Government to finally do something meaningful.

Here it is:

It’s a pathetically tragic response. There’s nothing in here we haven’t heard before, and even though the letter emphasises the previous steps taken in tackling these crimes, presumably to demonstrate the Government’s ‘determination’ to act, what it actually does is just highlight the length of time the Government has been tip-toeing around (since 2007) without producing any significant results at all.

The letter also includes the tired old line that we have to wait for the Werritty Review. We’ve been waiting for over two years and for all that time the Government has used it as an excuse to do absolutely nothing in the face of ongoing criminal activity. The excuse is tired, we’re tired of hearing it, and we’re tired of the criminals being allowed to run amok and suffer zero consequences.

Interestingly, this most recent letter is very similar to another letter that was sent to one of our blog readers in early July in response to the news in May that satellite-tagged hen harrier Marci had ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park (here) and that four geese had been found poisoned on another grouse-shooting estate in the Cairngorms National Park after someone had used the banned pesticide Carbofuan (here).

But there’s a significant difference between the two letters:

“The evidence continues to point to the likelihood that these people are connected with grouse moor management“.

Gosh, who knew?

Both letters indicate that the Werritty Review is ‘due to report in the next few weeks’, even though both letters were written weeks apart.

According to Professor Werritty himself, the report will be submitted “during the summer“, which of course could mean anytime between now and when the clocks go back at the end of October.

How many more raptors do you think will have been illegally killed by the time the report is submitted? And how many more illegally killed even after the report has been submitted and the Government is ‘considering it carefully’?

Sorry if this blog sounds impatient. Actually, we’re not sorry at all. Our patience has been stretched to its limit and has now expired.

Why’s it so difficult to get the Government to act?

Scottish Government ready to increase penalties for wildlife crime – this is significant!

The Scottish Government has recently launched a short public consultation, seeking views on a substantial increase of penalties for wildlife crime.

This has been a long time coming. Six years, in fact.

In 2013, the then Environment Minister Paul Wheelhouse commissioned a review on whether penalties for wildlife crime should be increased, as a direct response to ongoing illegal raptor persecution. Professor Mark Poustie submitted his report and a series of recommendations, including a penalty increase, in 2015. The then Environment Minister Dr Aileen McLeod broadly accepted those recommendations in 2016 and the Scottish Government committed to progressing them in its 2017/2018 Programme for Government.

Now it’s 2019 and we have yet another consultation, although to be fair this consultation is short (opened 19th July, closes 16th August) and judging by this illustration doing the rounds via Scot Gov social media accounts, this consultation appears to be a formality:

Wildlife crime can include barbaric acts of cruelty and can have significant consequences for the
conservation status of protected species. Penalties need to be dissuasive and of personal significance to act
as a deterrent. Time and time again we’ve seen pathetically lenient sentences for raptor persecution that have offered zero deterrent effect and have been of no personal significance to the criminal (e.g. when a shooting estate pays their guilty employee’s fine or when the offender’s employment isn’t terminated) so as far as we’re concerned, a substantial increase in the available penalties is long overdue and would be very welcome. It would also bring Scotland more up to date with countries like Spain, whose Government is not only saying it has zero tolerance for raptor persecution, it’s backing up that claim with massive penalties for those convicted (e.g. see here, here and here).

However, the most significant aspect of these current proposals, as far as we’re concerned, is the five-year custodial penalty. This is big, big news because effectively it would mean that Police Scotland would now have the authority to apply for permission, under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers (Scotland) Act 2000 (RIPSA), to install covert cameras on private sporting estates for the purpose of detecting wildlife crime.

Currently, Police Scotland do not have the authority to seek permission to install covert cameras as part of an investigation simply because raptor persecution crimes do not merit a custodial sentence of three years or more. Authority will only be given if the activity is considered ‘proportionate’ and when the crime being detected is considered ‘serious’ (i.e. where the penalty would constitute a term of imprisonment for three years or more).

As we’ve seen in recent years, the RSPB has installed covert cameras at the remote nest sites of specially protected birds of prey and have recorded what is obviously a wildlife crime, but because the RSPB is a charity and not a statutory agency it is ineligible for RIPA/RIPSA authorisation so clever defence lawyers have been able to get cases thrown out of court on technicalities, and more recently some of these cases haven’t even reached court because the Crown prosecutors have decided the footage is inadmissible (e.g. see here and here).

As the legislation stands at the moment, it is not fit for purpose when it comes to detecting raptor persecution crimes in remote landscapes where the landowner may have a vested interest in the commission of that crime. If the Scottish Government amends the legislation to increase the maximum penalty to five years in prison, we would be very, very happy.

We’d encourage as many of you as possible to fill in the short consultation form and encourage the Scottish Government to press ahead with its proposals. Background info and the consultation itself can be found here. Don’t forget it closes on 16th August.

Just a word of warning to the Scottish Government, though. Even if stiffer penalties are applied to those who commit serious wildlife crime, and even if those penalties would be of personal significance to the criminal, their deterrent effect would still be minimal if the offenders still know that the chance of being caught in the act is so slim that this outweighs the risk of committing the offence in the first place. Hopefully the chances of being caught will be significantly increased if the police are able to use covert cameras, but those cameras will only capture certain crimes. There will be plenty of other crimes committed, away from nest sites and other fixed positions such as crow cage traps, and those offenders need to believe that police response times and follow ups will be timely and thorough.

Conservationists Packham & Avery risked ‘violence from shooters’ at Game Fair, according to shooting industry reps

Good grief, you couldn’t make this up.

A couple of weeks ago Mark Avery & Chris Packham were invited to participate in a question & answer session at this weekend’s Game Fair.

They’d been invited (and had accepted the invite) by Charlie Jacoby, someone who claims to be a journalist but who doesn’t seem to have any comprehension of the value of research, of fact-checking nor of libel laws. But that’s for another day. Jacoby’s shortcomings are not the subject of this blog.

Jacoby is hosting a series of talks, interviews and debates in the Game Fair Theatre and he wanted to drill Mark and Chris on the work of Wild Justice. It was all set to go, until Tuesday evening when Mark and Chris were told that the Game Fair officials had banned them from participating, after pressure from BASC, Countryside Alliance and GWCT – you can read about this on Mark’s blog (here).

It’s also worth checking out the statement issued by BASC, accusing Chris (and presumably Mark) of being ‘extremists’. It’s an odd accusation from an organisation that wrote a guest blog for Mark earlier this year (here)!

Many are seeing this as a massive own goal by the game shooting industry (because it is! What are they scared of?) and there’s plenty of lively debate about it on social media. But there’s also something else that might have contributed to the organisers’ decision.

Check out this email, screen grabbed from a dreadful video by Jacoby who was trying to explain to his viewers why the Game Fair organisers had scuppered his plans for a debate:

The email is from Jacoby, sent to Tim Bonner (CEO Countryside Alliance), James Gower (Managing Director of the Game Fair), Ian Bell (CEO BASC) and Teresa Dent (CEO GWCT and Natural England board member).

Ignore the uninformed (and wholly inaccurate) commentary about Panorama and town hall events – these are simply a figment of Jacoby’s paranoia and Mark will be blogging about this later today.

But check out that statement we’ve underlined in red:

“I agree we risk violence from shooters”.

Violence? From shooters? Surely not! Aren’t we repeatedly told that anyone with a firearms or shotgun certificate has to be an upstanding member of the community, to be of no threat to anyone’s safety, and certainly not to have a tendency for violence?

It’s an astonishing admission from the game shooting industry, that the mere sight of Mark and Chris at the Game Fair could trigger an explosion of violence from volatile members of this so-called law-abiding community.

Let’s hope the Game Fair organisers have good indemnity insurance if their audience includes so many hysterical homicidal uncontrollable thugs- just imagine the bloodshed if they run out of Pimms in the VIP tent or if someone spots a salad on the burger van menu. It’ll be carnage!

UPDATE: Just when you thought their PR car crash couldn’t get any worse……have a look at this (here).