Category: Opinion

So long, Sheriff Drummond

One of the most influential figures in the world of Scottish wildlife crime enforcement, and particularly in relation to raptor persecution, has finally retired. There are some who will be delighted with this news, others not so much.

Sheriff Kevin Drummond QC left office this week after 13 years in the Sheriff courts of the Scottish Borders. In addition, he’d played a significant role on various PAW Scotland committees, including Chair of the Legislation, Regulation and Guidance Sub Group (see here), and was a member of the high-level PAW Scotland Executive Group (see here). He was also heavily involved in the provision of ‘mock trials’ as part of a training programme for police wildlife crime officers and procurators fiscal to help prepare them for dealing with wildlife crime trials. Prior to being appointed Sheriff, he had worked as a leading defence QC whose clients included gamekeepers accused of wildlife crimes. His own reported hobbies include shooting and fishing (see here).

An article in the Selkirk Advertiser reporting his retirement (see here) describes the Sheriff as ‘well-respected’, ‘fair and consistent’ and ‘kind and approachable’. We’d agree with ‘consistent’ at least. In a number of cases over which Sheriff Drummond presided around 2006-2007 there was opportunity to sentence the convicted gamekeepers in his court to jail time – a provision that had at the time been recently introduced in an attempt to crack down on raptor persecution. Disappointingly, Sheriff Drummond decided that community service orders were adequate punishments for these convicted poisoners, including one case that had been described by one RSPB investigator as ‘the worst he had seen in 20 years’. This reluctance to send convicted poisoners to jail is still very much in evidence in Sheriff courts right across Scotland – there still hasn’t been a single one.

Sheriff Drummond held strong views against the introduction of vicarious liability – his visibly agitated performance in front of the WANE bill committee in 2010 was quite a display – and he also strongly opposed the concept of increasing the investigatory powers of SSPCA inspectors to allow them to take on raptor persecution cases (e.g. see here).

There were calls for the Sheriff’s dismissal from the PAW Scotland group following another of his outbursts at the Police Wildlife Crime Conference in 2010 when a wildlife investigator asked whether there should be tougher sentences for wildlife criminals. Sheriff Drummond’s reported response, “Get a life“, was met with ‘shock and bewilderment’ by conference delegates but was later defended by then Environment Minister Roseanna Cunningham (see here).

Many years earlier RSPB Investigator Dave Dick also found himself on the receiving end of one of the Sheriff’s seemingly characteristic tantrums. Here’s an excerpt from Dave’s 2012 book, Wildlife Crime: The Making of an Investigations Officer:

“Thursday 20 June 1991. Jedburgh Sheriff Court and Jimmy [a gamekeeper] has got himself a QC – or more correctly, Jimmy’s boss, a wealthy Austrian banker, has got Jimmy a QC. Kevin Drummond, QC, who walks into the Fiscal’s office just before the trial is due to start, where I am having a last-minute conference as was the normal, efficient practice by 1991. Kevin announces that he is going to win this case because Section 19 of the 1981 Act does not permit a constable to enter land and search for evidence. The Fiscal may have been used to this robust, even arrogant approach but I wasn’t and in my naivety, combined with experience of Section 19 in court, I blurted out, “Do you really think that’s what Parliament thought, when they drew this up?” The resulting angry out-burst (‘You may be very good at what you do out there, Mr Dick, but in here, I’m in charge!’) was my first sight of an apparent lack of control which I have since witnessed many times“.

It is without question that Sheriff Drummond has had considerable influence on the approach taken to tackling wildlife crime in Scotland, at both a strategic governmental level as well as on the front-line level in court. That influence has been welcomed by some, while exasperating others.

Today is his 70th birthday and we wish him a long and enjoyable retirement – here’s hoping he doesn’t ‘do a Dysart‘ – we’re all hoping for the start of a new era.

Why we don’t trust the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation

A few days ago, Charles Nodder, Political Advisor to the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation (NGO), wrote on this blog:

“You should regard us [the NGO] as a key part of the solution [to stamping out illegal raptor persecution], not part of the problem. An organisation to be supported, not attacked”.

The thing is, in order to support an organisation there first needs to be a level of trust. It’s very hard for us to trust the NGO, and here’s why…

Until recently, we were under the impression (mistakenly, as it turns out) that the NGO wouldn’t tolerate any illegal gamekeeping activity and if any of their members were convicted of such an offence, they would be expelled from the organisation. This is what the NGO wants us all to believe, as outlined in their own Disciplinary Code, as published on their website.

However, it would now appear that the NGO does, in our opinion, tolerate some illegal gamekeeping activity. This has only come to light because we discovered that the NGO member who has been applying for licences to kill buzzards (and now sparrowhawks too) was recently convicted for being in possession of several banned poisons, including Carbofuran, the most common poison used to illegally kill birds of prey. We have now discovered that the NGO member, who we have called Mr Buzzard Licence Applicant, was not booted out of the NGO following his conviction for a wildlife crime that is closely linked with the illegal poisoning of birds of prey. Not only was he not booted out, but the NGO then actively supported this member by helping him to apply for his buzzard and sparrowhawk-killing licences.

When challenged about this, Mr Nodder provided some fascinating responses on this blog (see here). Before we take a closer look at those responses, we would first like to acknowledge Mr Nodder’s willingness to engage in conversation on this blog. That’s to his credit; there are many others within the game-shooting industry who have repeatedly refused to engage with us, citing excuses such as, “We don’t communicate with anonymous individuals” but who then go on to complain that we publish articles without giving them the right to reply!! Quite an astonishing response given today’s world of multi-media and social networking communications. A missed opportunity for them, but not really that surprising when you consider that many of them are still hanging on to other 19th Century ideals.

Anyway, back to that NGO policy of supposedly not tolerating any illegal gamekeeping activity.

To begin with, Mr Nodder tried to claim that “The possession of a banned substance [and remember we’re talking here about banned poisons that are routinely used to illegally poison wildlife] is quite clearly a possession offence and not an offence against wildlife”. We were astounded by this comment. There are many, many examples of ‘possession’ offences that are inextricably linked to wildlife crime. Here are just a few examples:

  • Possession of a dead red kite (see James Rolfe case).
  • Possession of 10.5kg of the banned poison Carbofuran (see Dean Barr case).
  • Possession of the banned poison Carbofuran (see Cyril McLachlan case).
  • Possession of wild birds eggs (see Matthew Gonshaw cases).
  • Possession of an illegal pole trap (see Ivan Crane case).
  • Possession of a wild bird (see Craig Barrie case).
  • Possession of live & dead birds for trade/taxidermy (see Gary McPhail case).
  • Possession of the banned poison Alphachloralose (see David Whitefield case).
  • Possession of the banned poison Carbofuran (see Tom McKellar case).
  • Possession of wild birds (see Cogoo Sherman Bowen case).
  • Possession of the banned poisons Carbofuran, Strychnine and Alphachloralose (see Peter Bell case).
  • Possession of wild birds eggs (see Keith Liddell case).
  • Possession of the banned poison Sodium Cyanide (see William Scobie case).
  • Possession of dead wild birds (see Luke Byrne case).
  • Possession of the banned poisons Carbofuran and Alphachloralose (see Graham Kerr case).

In many of these example cases, poisoned and/or other illegally killed raptors were also discovered. Indeed, in many cases it is the discovery of these poisoned animals that then leads on to a police investigation and search that then leads to the discovery of a stash of banned poisons. Quite often, as we all know, the subsequent charges that are brought do not often include charges for actually poisoning the wildlife, but instead the charges relate to the ‘lesser’ (in legal terms) offence of ‘possession’, either due to plea bargaining or due to lack of evidence needed to secure a conviction for the actual poisoning of a wild animal. It stands to reason that the actual poisoning of wildlife is inextricably linked to the possession of banned poisons; in order to poison wildlife, the criminal obviously first has to be in possession of the poison to carry out the act of poisoning.

The National Wildlife Crime Unit defines the possession of a banned poison as a wildlife crime – the Unit often publicises convictions for the possession of banned poisons in its reports. The Scottish Government also defines convictions for possession of banned poisons as wildlife crime – indeed, this is one of the offences that can trigger a prosecution under the new vicarious liability legislation, brought in specifically to address the continuing illegal persecution of raptors. The Crown Office considers possession of banned poisons as a wildlife crime because its specialist wildlife prosecutors take on these cases. The Partnership for Action against Wildlife Crime (PAW, of which the NGO boasts membership) also considers possession of banned poisons a wildlife crime – they, too, publicise ‘possession’ convictions in their newsletters.

So why is it that the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation doesn’t accept possession of banned poisons as a wildlife crime? And if they don’t, why the hell are they allowed to participate in the Raptor Persecution Wildlife Crime Priority Group? Surely that group has been established to find ways of stamping out illegal raptor persecution, but how can it achieve that if one organisational member refuses to expel members who have been convicted of a serious wildlife crime? It makes a mockery of the whole group and does absolutely nothing to instill public confidence in the sincerity of the process.

Mr Nodder’s next explanation for why Mr Buzzard Licence Applicant wasn’t booted out of the NGO was to suggest that possession of a banned poison was not a ‘gamekeeping activity’. On the contrary, if Mr Nodder took the time to look at the conviction statistics (publicly available to those who want to look) he would notice that the significant majority of those convicted for possession of banned poisons are gamekeepers, and that trend has continued for many years. In the case of Mr Buzzard Licence Applicant, his stashes of banned poisons were found in his work vehicle and inside one of his pheasant pens. There’s simply no denying it, unless of course you happen to be the NGO, trying to justify why you haven’t stuck to your stated Disciplinary Code and expelled a member for his criminal conviction.

And what sort of message does this policy send to other NGO members? ‘Don’t worry if you get caught in possession of banned poisons, we won’t kick you out of the club’. It makes you wonder what the law-abiding members of the NGO feel about this policy. If you were a law-abiding member (and there must be some, surely), would you want to be a member of a group that welcomed those with a criminal conviction related to banned poisons? If the NGO doesn’t distinguish between criminal and law-abiding members, why should we?

The third argument Mr Nodder used to try and get us to drop what must be quite embarrassing questions was to pull out the old ‘It’s a spent conviction so we can’t discuss it’ routine. Nice try, but in this case, wholly inapplicable. The legislation that prevents publication of so-called ‘spent convictions’ is the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (see here for a good explanation). Its basic premise is that after a period of x years of rehabilitation (depending on the type of crime committed – in this case, five years), the conviction can be ignored and need not be divulged (with one or two exceptions). If somebody does then publish information about the conviction, they may be subject to libel damages, but only if the primary motive of publishing the information was malicious. In this case, seeing as though we haven’t named Mr Buzzard Licence Applicant, even though we’ve had lots of opportunity to do so (and indeed our own received legal advice was that we could name him), it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to demonstrate that we are acting in malice (against him as an individual) by discussing his spent conviction because he hasn’t been identified as a named individual. Our primary motive for discussing this case has been to (a) examine the Natural England/DEFRA policy that allows convicted wildlife criminals to apply for licences to kill protected species (see earlier blogs on this), and (b) to examine the sincerity of the NGO’s claims that they won’t tolerate any illegal gamekeeping activity and will expel any member with such a conviction.

And while we’re on the subject of the Rehab of Offenders Act, we’ve made a very interesting observation. Certain professions are exempt from the Act, so that individuals are not allowed to withhold details of previous convictions in relation to job applications. These professions include teachers, social workers, doctors, dentists, vets, accountants etc. But interestingly, also included are “Employees of the RSPCA or SSPCA whose duties extend to the humane killing of animals”. Now then, it is beyond question that the duties of gamekeepers ‘extend to the humane killing of animals’. They probably kill (legitimately) more animals on a daily basis than all the RSPCA and SSPCA employees put together. So why are gamekeepers not included in this list of exemptions? Why should a gamekeeper be able to hide past wildlife crime convictions but an RSPCA/SSPCA employee cannot? That’s a question for the policy makers…

In summary then, in our opinion the NGO’s stated claim that they don’t tolerate any illegal gamekeeping activity is not convincing. They don’t view the possession of a banned poison as a wildlife crime and a conviction for possession of a banned poison is not enough to warrant expulsion from the NGO, even when that poison just happens to be the most commonly used substance to illegally kill birds of prey. It doesn’t matter to us how many wildlife crime groups the NGO has joined – in our view this is just a convenient shield for hiding true intentions – we don’t trust them and will continue to view them with suspicion until they start to back up their stated claims with convincing actions.

SGA Chairman’s ignorance could fuel goshawk persecution

The Scottish Gamekeepers’ Association has recently published its autumn magazine. It’s full of quite remarkable material, as you might expect. We’ll be blogging about some of the articles in due course but thought we’d start with the ‘Chairman’s Column’, written by Alex Hogg.

He writes about a few issues but of particular concern to us is what he wrote about goshawks. Here’s an excerpt:

“My local newspaper has just published an article on ringing chicks at a goshawk nest on forestry commission ground. In the article, gamekeepers are criticised for persecuting goshawks, without any attempts at providing proof, journalistic balance or an attempt to look at the history of the goshawk in Scotland. For the past 35 years I have lived with goshawks on my doorstep. I strongly believe the goshawk never was indigenous to the United Kingdom and there is absolutely no hard evidence to suggest otherwise. Those that illegally released this species into the British Isles could legitimately be charged, therefore, with a wildlife crime. These nests in the article are in commercial forestry where there is nothing whatsoever for the poor chicks to eat. What happens then? The young make their way out onto keepered ground, managed at significant cost and time to create a richness in biodiversity. Our local red squirrel population is now under severe threat and much of this can be put down to predation by the goshawk. Most raptors will eat what they kill. The goshawk will kill over and over again. The largest number of pheasant poults I lost on a stubble in one strike was 35. God knows what this could mean for our poor Curlews and Lapwings, teetering on the brink. Balance must surely be considered before we lose more precious species“.

Hogg’s display of ignorance about this species is quite staggering. The history of the goshawk in the British Isles, including its indigenous status, has been very well documented in many scientific papers and books, as have the effects of the relentless persecution it has suffered and continues to suffer, as well as its varied diet which changes according to latitude and habitat (he should try reading this and the references listed as a basic introduction).

Such is the concern about ongoing goshawk persecution that the species is listed by the National Wildlife Crime Unit as one of the ‘priority species’ to focus on, along with golden eagle, hen harrier, peregrine, red kite and white-tailed eagle. Every single one of these species is suffering population-level effects thanks to the illegal persecution carried out by those with game-shooting interests. As a participating member of PAW Scotland and PAW Scotland’s Raptor Persecution Group, Hogg should be very well aware of the pressures already facing this species.

For somebody in his position to be writing such unsubstantiated nonsense about an already significantly-threatened raptor is completely unacceptable. There will be some readers of the SGA magazine who will assume that Hogg’s information is reliable and credible and could use it as justification to persecute the goshawk.

Hogg should be hauled over the coals by the PAW Scotland group for such ignorance and irresponsibility.

We’ll be returning to the issue of goshawk persecution by gamekeepers in the very near future…..watch this space.

Gos1

 

supersize me

Check this out. It’s a giant supersized clam trap (also known as a Larsen Mate trap, a snapper trap and a butterfly trap) that was on sale at this summer’s Galloway Country Fair.

These traps are supposedly for catching crows.

Do you think the trap size has been increased from the standard size to allow the trapped victim more space to be comfortable before it’s bludgeoned to death by the trap operator? Or do you think the size has been increased to allow the capture of larger species…?

We’ve blogged a lot about these controversial traps over the last 12 months (see here and scroll down through the posts) and we’re likely to be blogging about them again before the end of the year as we await SNH’s proposed ‘Code of Conduct’ on trap use, likely to be published in November/December when the 2014 General Licences are announced…

The untouchables

Last month we blogged about getting our hands on the Leadhills Estate Game Book and our interest in the lists of killed ‘vermin’ dating over several decades (see here). These ‘vermin’ lists include the usual species that are typically referred to as ‘vermin’ by the game-shooting industry: species such as foxes, stoats, weasels and crows. However, also included on these ‘vermin’ lists are supposedly protected species such as birds of prey, ravens, otters and badgers. We said we’d blog about the lists in more detail when we had more time.

Leadhills game book vermin lists

Since then an independent academic has contacted us to ask whether we’d consider allowing access to the documents so the data could be analysed, in combination with other data sources, to provide a ~50 year dossier of alleged illegal raptor persecution incidents recorded at Leadhills Estate, stretching from the 1970s right up to the present day. These results would be written up as a peer-reviewed paper in a scientific journal. We think that such a paper would hold much more gravitas than a simple analysis of a sub-set of those data written up for this blog so we have agreed to pass the information to the academic. We look forward to seeing the results in due course.

So as not to steal the academic’s thunder we won’t be writing in detail about the contents, but we did want to share one startling statistic.

We looked at the number of killed ‘hawks’ listed in the Leadhills Estate Game Book, just between the years 1980-1987. The vermin lists in the Game Book stretch well beyond these years but we selected this particular period because we wanted to compare the figures with the RSPB’s published figures for all of Scotland during this period (the RSPB data were published in McMillan’s 2011 paper – here).

Here’s what we found:

RSPB: Number of illegally killed raptors recorded for the whole of Scotland between 1980 and 1987 = 91 birds.

Leadhills Estate Game Book: Number of illegally killed raptors recorded on Leadhills Estate between 1980 and 1987 = 383 birds.

The difference between these two figures gives a very clear illustration of a situation that conservationists have been arguing for decades: that is, the ‘official’ recorded figures of illegally-killed raptors that are published each year by the RSPB are just the tip of a bloody great big massive iceberg. Just on this one estate (Leadhills), more than four times as many raptors were recorded illegally killed during this seven-year period than those officially reported throughout the whole of Scotland. That’s just one estate. Think what these figures would look like if we had access to the vermin lists of other estates across Scotland!

Now, there’ll be some in the game-shooting industry who will argue that raking over historical persecution records dating back 30 years is irrelevant. They’ll claim that although persecution was common practice several decades ago, things have now changed for the better and it’s only the odd ‘rogue’ estate that are still at it. This, of course, is absolute nonsense. Anybody who bothers to read through the pages of this blog will know that that is simply not a true statement. Sure, some estates have since got their acts together and are now supporting healthy raptor populations on their land (e.g. see Atholl Estate in McMillan’s 2011 paper above) but these estates seem to be exceptional: there are many, many other estates that are still, even to this day, systematically and illegally persecuting raptors and many of them seem to have a curious immunity to prosecution.

leadhills estateLeadhills Estate has been at the centre of allegations of wildlife crime for a very long time. The list of confirmed reported incidents dating from 2003 to 2011 makes for shocking reading (see here). Of these 41 confirmed incidents, only a couple have resulted in a prosecution and a conviction.

Earlier this year we reported the discovery of a substantial illegal stash of poisoned baits that was reportedly found on the estate (see here). Unsurprisingly, six months later we’re still waiting for Police Scotland to issue a statement.

What was particularly interesting about this incident was the reaction of the Scottish landowners’ organisation, Scottish Land and Estates. They refused to discuss the incident, citing an ‘on-going police investigation’ (how very convenient – this excuse relieves them of having to comment on any alleged persecution incident that never gets resolved – i.e. most of them). They also wrote to the Environment Minister and posted an article on their website complaining about the alleged incident being reported on this blog (see here). They gave an impression of being more outraged by the reporting of the incident than they were of the alleged discovery of a big stash of deadly poisoned baits on a Scottish sporting estate.

Now, compare that reaction to their response to the conviction of gamekeeper Peter Bell earlier this year. Bell was convicted of four offences including the poisoning of a buzzard on the Glasserton and Physgill Estates. Immediately following his conviction, Scottish Land and Estates issued a statement to say that Glasserton had been booted out of their organisation (see here). So why didn’t SLE issue a similarly strong statement when the poisoned baits had allegedly been found at Leadhills? They could argue that nothing is proven until a conviction has been secured, as in the Glasserton case. But if that is their argument, then why didn’t they distance themselves from Leadhills Estate when a Leadhills Estate gamekeeper (Lewis Whitham) was convicted of laying a poisoned bait in 2010 (see here)? Why is Leadhills Estate, with its long, long, long history of alleged wildlife crime, treated so differently to an estate like Glasserton, which in relative terms barely registers on the persecution radar? Back in June we asked SLE to provide some transparency about their relationship with Leadhills Estate (see here). They still haven’t.

There may be some who will argue that things are about to change at Leadhills Estate with the shooting lease now up for sale; the sales document itself makes for an interesting read – note the reason given for the current tenants’ departure and the fate of the gamekeepers currently employed on Leadhills Estate: Leadhills brochure 2013

Yes, there may well be a change in the tenancy but will that make any difference? There have been numerous shooting tenants at Leadhills Estate over the years and yet, if the available data are to be believed, the background level of alleged persecution has remained constant.

The raptor killers, whoever they are, appear to be untouchable.

SNH put positive spin on worrying golden eagle news

eagle-poisoned2There’s a very curious news item doing the rounds this morning that seems to have originated from an SNH press release. The news is that two immature female golden eagles have attempted to breed in two different locations and that this is somehow an indication of a potential ‘upturn’ in the fortunes of the Scottish golden eagle population.

To the unassuming general public, the news that golden eagles are breeding at an earlier age than normal (3 years old instead of the usual 4-6 years) may well sound like a positive story. On a superficial level this is probably true – breeding golden eagles, at whatever age, has got to be good news, right?

Wrong!

According to several scientific studies, the occurrence of breeding subadult eagles should actually be used as an early-warning of potential population decline. The reason these Scottish golden eagles are attempting to breed at three years of age is because there is little or no competition for that vacant territory. Why is there little or no competition? Because one or both of the territorial adults have been killed and there are very few non-breeding adults (known as ‘floaters’) around to challenge for the territory. If the population was healthy, it would be these breeding-age floaters that would move in to the territory, not an immature three-year old bird.

An excellent study (Whitfield et al. 2004 – see below) has also demonstrated that subadult and mixed-age breeding golden eagle pairs in Scotland have lower breeding success than adult pairs – a result of inexperience and persecution, seeing as most golden eagle territories in Scotland with subadult breeders are in areas associated with illegal persecution.

Des Thompson from SNH does mention the link to persecution in this press release but he kind of glosses over this and instead suggests that these young breeders are good news. They are good news as long as they are not bumped off, and the chances of them being bumped off is quite high because, as mentioned above, these territories with immature breeders are only available because the adults have already been persecuted.

Instead of spinning this as a ‘good news story’ and ignoring the known warning signs of a population in decline, SNH should be telling us how they are going to beef up their conservation efforts at these sites and get the Scottish golden eagle population back to a favourable conservation status – as it is, it is far from that.

The news story has been reported here, here and here.

Here is a PDF of the scientific study mentioned above, entitled The Effects of Persecution on Age of Breeding and Territory Occupation in Golden Eagles in Scotland:  Effects of persecution on age GE

Environment Minister responds to our questions about his ‘further measures’ to tackle raptor persecution

On July 1st, Environment Minister Paul Wheelhouse laid out his ‘further measures’ to tackle the on-going problem of raptor persecution (here).

Whilst we welcomed his intentions, we wanted further clarification about these ‘further measures’ as well as some updates on previously-promised measures, so on July 2nd we posed five clear questions to him (see here).

This week, one of our blog readers received the following response from Wheelhouse’s wildlife crime policy officer:

Question 1:

Please can you clarify whether the Lord Advocate has instructed COPFS to accept covert video footage as admissible evidence in prosecutions for alleged raptor persecution incidents?

Answer:

The Lord Advocate has instructed the specialist prosecutors in the Wildlife and Environmental Crime Unit to work with Police Scotland to ensure that law enforcement utilises all investigative tools at their disposal in the fight against wildlife crime including tools such as video surveillance equipment where justified and appropriate.

Before instituting any prosecution, the Procurator Fiscal must be satisfied that there is sufficient admissible evidence to justify doing so. Established rules of evidence determine whether a court can take into account certain types of evidence including third party video evidence. If evidence does not comply with these rules, it is inadmissible and the court may not take it into account. In considering any case for prosecution, the Procurator Fiscal will assess, having regard to the particular facts and circumstances of any evidence and the manner in which it was obtained, whether the court will allow it to be considered. For example, the court may refuse to take account of evidence that has been obtained improperly, irregularly or unlawfully.

Our assessment:

It’s hard to know if the Lord Advocate’s instruction will make a blind bit of difference. Covert video evidence is routinely accepted as admissible evidence in England. It has, also, been previously accepted in Scotland, albeit rarely. More often than not, COPFS rejects it and we’re never provided with a transparent answer about why it was rejected. We’ve struggled to understand the legal reasoning behind these repeat rejections, especially when, as we understand it, the decision to accept or reject evidence should be made by the court (the Sheriff), not COPFS. We’ll just have to wait and see how covert video surveillance is treated in any future cases….and it’s quite likely we won’t have long to wait.

Question 2:

Please can you clarify the timescale for SNH’s review for introducing potential restrictions on the use of General Licences in areas where they have good reason to believe crimes against wild birds have been committed? In other words, when can we expect the review to be completed? Also, will their review be made publicly available?

Answer:

Officials are currently discussing with Scottish Natural Heritage how they will carry out the work to examine how and in what circumstances they can restrict the use of General Licences to trap and shoot wild birds on land where they have good reason to believe that crimes against wild birds have taken place. Timescales for completing the work are still to be concluded, but we would expect any new arrangements to be in place for next year and will ensure that we keep stakeholders in PAW Scotland informed of progress. SNH will be clear to all users of General Licences when and in what circumstances their use will be restricted or prohibited.

Our assessment:

This seems a perfectly reasonable explanation. We look forward to watching the developments.

Question 3:

Please can you advise whether there will be a prosecution under the new vicarious liability legislation following the recent conviction of gamekeeper Peter Bell, found guilty of poisoning offences on the Glasserton and Physgill Estates? If you don’t know the answer (which would be surprising, given that you said in March 2013 that you would be “keeping an eye on this particular area [i.e. vicarious liability] with interest”, please can you provide the contact details of someone who can answer the question?

Answer:

It would be inappropriate to comment further on this case as police enquiries have not yet concluded.

Our assessment:

Not very impressed, but as this case is probably the first of its kind to be considered under the new vicarious liability legislation, we don’t have any benchmark to be able to compare the timescales involved. It’s been 8 months since the crimes were committed (December 2012). Is it reasonable to expect Police Scotland to still be conducting enquiries or is this another fob-off to delay telling us that no charges will be brought under VL legislation? If they are still making enquiries, let’s hope they’re making a better job on this case than they did on this one! We’ll keep asking questions about this case every so often so it can’t just be swept quietly under the carpet.

Question 4:

Please can you tell us the status of the Scottish Government’s first annual report (2012) into wildlife crime? As you know, under the Wildlife and Natural Environment (Scotland) Act 2011, there is now a requirement (under section 26B) that ‘Scottish Ministers must, after the end of each calendar year, lay before the Scottish Parliament a report on offences relating to wildlife’. You mentioned in March 2013 that your policy officials ‘are currently working on’ this report. When can we expect this report to be available?

Answer:

Section 26B of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 requires Scottish Ministers, after the end of each calendar year, to lay before the Scottish Parliament an annual report on wildlife crime. We will of course comply with that requirement and it is in preparation. Details about the laying of the report, including the timing, will be given to the Parliament in the first instance in accordance with established parliamentary protocol. We will, of course, ensure that the report publication is communicated to stakeholders and Parliament.

Our assessment:

It’s taking a very long time for this report to be published. We’ll keep asking about it.

Question 5:

Please can you tell us when, exactly, will you open the consultation regarding the increase of SSPCA powers to broaden the range of their work investigating wildlife crime? As you know, this consultation was first suggested by former MSP Peter Peacock as an amendment during the WANE Act debates, way back in February 2011. The then Environment Minister Roseanna Cunningham rejected it as an amendment but suggested a consultation was in order. Seven months later in September 2011, MSP Elaine Murray lodged a motion that further powers for the SSPCA should be considered. In November 2011, Elaine Murray MSP formalised the question in a P&Q session and the next Environment Minister, Stewart Stevenson, then promised that the consultation would happen in the first half of 2012. Nothing happened so in September 2012 we asked you, as the new Environment Minister, when the consultation would take place. In response to one of our blog readers in October 2012 your policy officer said: “The consultation has been delayed by resource pressures but will be brought forward in the near future”. Nine months later and we’re in July 2013 – almost 2.5 years after Scottish Ministers committed to undertaking the consultation. Where is it?

Answer:

We regret that resource pressures did further delay the public consultation on the extension of SSPCA powers. However, I can confirm that the consultation document will be published later this year.

Our assessment:

As far as we’re concerned, this consultation, if it does actually appear this year, could be a game-changer. Forget bringing in new legislation to tackle raptor persecution – we don’t need it. The legislation is all there – it just needs to be enforced. The enforcement process begins with a criminal investigation. Do we have complete confidence in Police Scotland to effectively and efficiently undertake these investigations? Based on their past performance, that has to be a resounding NO, with just a handful of exceptions. Do we have confidence in the SSPCA to undertake these investigations? If we judge them on their track record for successful prosecutions under animal welfare legislation, then YES, we do. We also know that certain organisations associated with the game-shooting industry do not support these extended powers for the SSPCA – they argue that criminal investigations should be carried out by the police. Funny that, because they support extended powers for water bailiffs – is that because the water bailiffs are often acting in the interests of landowners and gamekeepers (e.g. when tackling poachers)? Do they not support extended powers for the SSPCA because they know that with an extra 75+ highly-trained officers on the ground then the chances of raptor persecution crimes being uncovered become greater? You’d think, given that the game-shooting industry claims to be all for stamping out raptor crime, that they’d welcome the SSPCA with open arms.  We’ll be watching closely for this consultation to finally emerge and you can expect a great deal of blogging about it when it is published.

‘Open season’ on hen harriers: how to complain about the councillor

Limerick Leaderlow resYesterday we reported on an article in the Limerick Leader that quoted Limerick Council Chair John Sheahan calling for an ‘open season’ on the specially protected hen harrier (see here).

That blog post has attracted a great deal of attention and understandably, people are both astonished and outraged that someone in a position of such influence and responsibility should be inciting people to commit wildlife crime and encouraging the illegal killing of hen harriers.

Incredibly, it emerged later in the day that Cllr Sheahan is not only the Chair of Limerick Council, but that he also represents Ireland at the EU Committee of the Regions, helping to form EU policies on environment and biodiversity issues!!! (See here).

Yesterday was quite frustrating in that we had great difficulty trying to find out how to make a formal complaint about Cllr Sheahan’s remarks. We know through our site stats that many of you (over 100) emailed Cllr Sheahan directly and we also know that the Minister for Agriculture, Simon Coveney, also received an avalanche of emails (he is the Minister that Cllr Sheahan intends to lobby about the hen harrier), so thank you to everyone who sent emails.

Since then, we have received more advice on who to complain to (thank you to blog reader Ryan Meade for the information). We would encourage as many of you as possible to send emails to the following two people, to formally complain about Cllr Sheahan’s comments. Obviously, these people should respond to just a single complaint but they are much more likely to take this issue seriously if they are inundated with complaints.

For those of you who don’t live in Ireland, please don’t think that Cllr Sheahan’s comments don’t affect hen harriers in the UK. Movements of hen harriers between Ireland and the UK have been well documented (see here for example), so what happens to hen harriers in Ireland will also have an effect on what happens to hen harriers in the UK, and vice versa.

Here’s some background info on the hen harrier for those who want to include it to back up your complaint:

The hen harrier is a species of high conservation concern in Ireland and the UK and is protected regionally under The Wildlife Act 1976 & Amendment Act 2000 and in Northern Ireland under The Wildlife (Northern Ireland) Order 1985. Hen harriers are listed on Annex 1 of the Birds Directive (2009/147/EEC) and are currently considered an All-Ireland Species of Conservation Concern and a UK priority species.

The EU Birds Directive provides a legislative framework of measures required for assessing and ensuring the conservation of the hen harrier which includes monitoring, research and the designation of Special Protection Areas (SPAs). Six sites have been designated as SPAs for hen harriers in Ireland:

The Slieve Bloom Mountains SPA (Counties Laois & Offaly; Site Code 4160);

The Stacks to Mullaghareirk Mountains SPA, West Limerick Hills and Mount Eagle SPA (Counties Cork, Kerry & Limerick; Site Code: 4161);

The Mullaghanish to Musheramore Mountains SPA (CountyCork; Site Code: 4162);

The Slievefelim to Silvermines Mountains SPA (Counties Limerick & Tipperary; Site Code: 4165);

Slieve Beagh SPA (CountyMonaghan; Site Code 4167);

The Slieve Aughty Mountains SPA (Counties Clare & Galway; Site Code 4168).

The first person to formally complain to is Conn Murray, who is the Limerick County Council Senior Manager (see here). His email address: conn.murray@limerick.ie. Conn Murray should be called to investigate Cllr Sheahan’s comments and to assess whether he is suitable to continue holding office as the Chair of Limerick Council.

The second person to formally complain to is Jimmy Deenihan, who is the Minister for Arts, Heritage and Gaeltacht. His remit includes the protection of wildlife (see here) and he should be very interested in Cllr Sheahan’s views on hen harriers and how those views might affect his role representing Ireland at the EU on biodiversity and environmental issues. His email address: jimmy.deenihan@oir.ie

We also think that Cllr Sheahan should be the subject of a police investigation for inciting wildlife crime. However, it appears that reporting an allegation to the Garda (police) is restricted to those who can call or visit the relevant local station (see here). We hope that some locals will pursue this.

Thanks, everyone.

UPDATE: A petition has been started calling for the resignation of Cllr Sheahan: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/358/804/673/

Council leader calls for ‘open season’ on hen harriers

A council leader has called for ‘open season’ on hen harriers, according to an article in the Limerick Leader on Saturday.

In an astonishingly ignorant and irresponsible statement, Councillor John Sheahan, Chair of Limerick County Council, has said that if restrictions in Special Protection Areas designated for Hen Harriers are not lifted, then “open season on the hen harrier should be declared”.

Here is a cutting from the newspaper (many thanks to the contributor who sent this in).

Limerick Leaderlow res

The text is probably difficult to read so here’s a transcript of part of it:

The new cathaoirleach [chair] of Limerick County Council, Cllr John Sheahan, has called for “open season” on the Hen Harrier unless there are changes to special protection areas (SPA).

Cllr Sheahan and Michael Sweeney, managing director of Select Forest Ltd, are due to meet with the Minister and Junior Minister for Agriculture, Simon Coveney and Tom Hayes ahead of the Budget.

Following the conclusion of the CAP deal, Cllr Sheahan called for a review of Natura 2000 sites, their designation and compensation for landowners adversely affected.

“Farming in the marginal lands of County Limerick is being decimated by the kosh of SPA. No proper plan is in place to assist farmers badly affected, total control is now with the National Parks and Wildlife Service – a cloak which our ministers and officials are happy to hide behind”, said Cllr Sheahan.

Large swathes of land in West Limerick and in some cases entire farms are designated to protect a predatory bird known as the Hen Harrier, he said.

“To some of us this name was an addition to our vocabulary, in days gone by it was a hawk. This protected bird has the power to stop a landowner reclaiming land, planting forestry, or constructing a windfarm.

“Following the bad weather of the last few years farmers are facing choices of how best they can manage their lands, and I stress their lands, to maximise its use and try and remain viable as part of the farming community. This is next to nigh possible with current restrictions.

“I believe now is the time to reassess all this. I believe the current CAP deal has scope within it to do so, there is no reason in my mind why this bird cannot coexist with some forestry and windfarms”, said Cllr Sheahan.

Since time began the world and all its components have evolved said the cathaoirleach.

“Charles Darwin proved this, the Hen Harrier will also evolve with changes we make. Landowners should be given the discretion they require to introduce a proper mix of activity and those who are adversely affected adequately compensated.

“Budget 2014 is coming earlier this year to suit the new fiscal treaty for Europe. I have written to the relevant ministers seeking a meeting to address this on behalf of the affected landowners of County Limerick”, said Cllr Sheahan.

“Budget 2014 should be the deadline for this and if nothing happens by then ‘open season’ should be declared on the Hen Harrier”, concluded Cllr Sheahan.

 The rest of the article refers to comments made by Michael Sweeney of Select Forest Ltd who discusses the earning capacity of the land.

The hen harrier is a species of high conservation concern in Ireland (just as it is in the UK), and is protected under regional, national and international legislation. For an excellent overview on the conservation status of hen harriers in Ireland, both past and present, this report is well worth reading.

If you think Cllr Sheahan’s threat of a declared ‘open season’ on this species is, frankly, nothing short of outrageous, then please email the Irish Agriculture Minister, Simon Coveney, and let him know what you think: simon.coveney@oir.ie

If you want to tell Councillor John Sheahan what you think, here are his contact details.

We’re trying to work out who to contact to make a formal complaint and call for Sheahan’s resignation. If anyone has any insight then please contact us. We’ll post details here when we know more.

UPDATE 9pm: Incredibly, Counciller Sheahan represents Ireland at the EU on Environment!! http://www.iro.ie/delegation.html#delegation Many thanks to @BBurke88 for the info.

We STILL haven’t found out how to make a formal complaint about Cllr Shehan’s remarks. We’ve tweeted Limerick Council Council to ask how we can make a formal complaint but had no response. We had hoped that one of the Irish conservation orgs would take a lead on this but haven’t heard anything, yet.

UPDATE 24th July: How to complain about Cllr Sheahan – see here

UPDATE 24th July: A petition has been started calling for the resignation of Cllr Sheahan: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/358/804/673/

UPDATE 25th July: Cllr Sheahan responds to the criticism – see here.

UPDATE 28th July: Cllr Sheahan remains unrepentant in an article published by the Sunday Times – see here.

UPDATE 4th August: Cllr Sheahan in radio debate about his comments – see here.

 

‘One or two estates’ may be persecuting hen harriers, says Environment Minister

The Scottish Government is persisting with its ‘Heads Up For Hen Harriers’ project – an initiative aimed at getting the general public involved with reporting sightings of hen harriers so the authorities can work out where they are and why they’re in decline. This ‘initiative’ was launched in April and now it’s back in the news.

The BBC has a film report from a hen harrier nest site in Perthshire (here)  – well done Wendy Mattingley from the Tayside Raptor Study Group for telling it how it is.

In addition to the film, Environment Minister Paul Wheelhouse was interviewed on Good Morning Scotland earlier today (audio clip available for 7 days here, starts at 2.13.40).

Here is a transcript of the radio interview:

GMS: Why do you need the public’s help here considering that the hen harrier is so intensively studied already?

PW: Well it’s because the hen harrier is an extremely sort of charismatic bird, I mean it’s not one that’s maybe well known and as well publicised but it’s a particularly wonderful species. The male is grey and white and black wing tips and it’s particularly sort of striking when people do see it. Many people regard the hen harrier as their favourite bird so we’re hoping to raise the profile of the species because it is under pressure from a number of problems and we know that there are only 505 sort of territorial pairs in Scotland as of three years ago and that had been a very significant decline since about six years prior to that so it is an important bird, it’s a very important bird for the landscape that it’s living in and we want to do all we can to protect it.

GMS: And what’s the problem, why is it in particular being targeted?

PW: Well one of the difficulties we have with the hen harrier is understanding exactly what it is that’s causing the numbers to decline. There certainly is a concern about illegal persecution of the bird, but there may be other possible changes in its climate and land-use issues such as forestry and grazing which might be impacting on their numbers, but it’s widely recognised that persecution has been a major factor, particularly where there’s been conflict with grouse management in the past.

GMS: Now there has been a clampdown legally on this, but is it working? It doesn’t seem to be.

PW: Well it’s certainly something we’re keen to find out. Certainly the work we’ve done through Heads Up for Hen Harriers, announced earlier in April, has indicated that the birds are present in places we didn’t know they were previously present so there’s some indication that the range is slightly bigger than we had thought, but we’re still evaluating the kind of sightings and going back checking whether they are accurate or not, but there’s certainly been, you know, pressure on numbers, we know that they’re not protected in England in the way they are in Scotland and so we’ve lost some, we believe, that have gone over the border and been persecuted there but the majority of problems are, I think, home grown ones and we need to sort of clamp down, as you say, on illegal persecution.

GMS: And do you think there is now a case to prosecute the landowners?

PW: Well certainly we have, through the WANE Act, the Wildlife & Natural Environment Act in 2011, put in place vicarious liability provisions which mean that no landowner can escape their responsibility of those that work for them. We’ve not yet seen a prosecution under vicarious liability but, you know, I imagine at some point in the future there probably will be one which will test the legal powers that we now have. But I think it’s already having an impact, that power, on the behaviour of landowners who are doing much more to train their staff, to ensure that they do not do anything to disturb or threaten species such as the hen harrier, so I hope that work does have a long-term benefit. But we’re always looking for, you know, the potential to prosecute a vicarious liability case just to test the waters.

GMS: And these organisations representing landowners, gamekeepers and field sports enthusiasts have condemned the illegal persecution but do you think, do you feel that they are on board here, that they are doing enough?

PW: I think the overwhelming majority of landowners are absolutely on side and are doing their best to try and tackle problems of illegal persecution. There are obviously, you know, suggestions of one or two estates which have had difficulties and the police authorities are sort of following those up and the Partnership for Action Against Wildlife Crime Scotland, which I chair, is working with landowners who are members of that organisation to try and improve practices and ensure that we do everything we can to protect species like the hen harrier, but other species as well such as the golden eagle and sea eagles which have also had, unfortunately, persecution in recent years. We also announced recently a number of provisions which we’re taking to try and strengthen our action on illegal persecution of raptors and they are supported, I think, by a number of key organisations such as gamekeepers and indeed the landowners.

GMS: We’ll have to leave it there, Paul Wheelhouse, the Scottish Environment Minister.

What wasn’t said in this interview was that there is the potential for an estimated 1467-1790 pairs of hen harriers to live in Scotland, according to the Hen Harrier Conservation Framework report, published by the government in 2011. However, the latest national survey results (from 2010) only found 505 pairs. And surprise surprise, the main areas where these birds are absent is on land managed as driven grouse moor in the Eastern Highlands and Southern Uplands. Sound familiar? Yep, exactly the same places where golden eagles are in trouble. What an amazing coincidence.

So, where are the 962-1,285 missing pairs of hen harriers? Wheelhouse is suggesting that the Heads Up for Hen Harriers initiative may have found some of them (although the results are still to be analysed and verified so his statement is rather premature to say the least). It’ll be fascinating to see those results in due course – perhaps they’ve found 1,000 pairs holed up in a crack den on a Glaswegian housing estate.

It is quite astonishing that still, more than 20 years after the alarm was first raised about the connection between driven grouse moors and hen harrier persecution, the authorities continue to play down the scale of the persecution issue and say, “One of the difficulties we have with the hen harrier is understanding what it is that’s causing the numbers to decline” and then pretend that the majority of the grouse-shooting industry is supportive of hen harriers. There are some who are on board, for sure, but the weight of evidence shows that those estates are in the minority – there must be a significant number of estates still ‘at it’ to have the population-level effect that we’re seeing.

We wrote a scathing critique of the Heads Up for Hen Harrier initiative when it was first launched in April. Rather than repeat it all here, it’s easier just to provide the link for those interested in reading it: see here. Our view hasn’t changed.

Hen Harriers will feature again on Reporting Scotland this evening.

The photo below is a reminder of what happens to hen harriers on grouse moors. This one was caught in an illegally-set trap on Moy Estate – he was lucky, he was found in time by raptor workers and he survived…for that day anyway.

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