Dear Natural England
This is a request under the EI Regs and/or Freedom of Information Act. It is a simple request for copies of three documents. It is not a difficult request to fulfill. Please send me the information within 10 working days of this request, ie by 20 September 2013.
This request refers to the Defra response to a complaint by the RSPB to the EU over the ‘Walshaw Moor Affair’. In their response to the EU Defra states ‘The 2012 management agreement was subject to an Appropriate Assessment, which concluded that the limited activities permitted would not have an adverse effect on the integrity of the SAC and SPA.’
- Please send me a copy of that Appropriate Assessment on which the 2012 management agreement was ‘based’.
- Please send me a copy of the Appropriate Assessment for the Regulation 23 Notice and the second notice of modification of consent sent out in December 2011.
- Please send me a copy of the Appropriate Assessment that went with the first modification of consent notice before legal proceedings began.
I believe that comparing these three documents, pertaining to the same site, written over a period of just a few months, will be enlightening as to the volte-face of NE in its legal case, the approach of NE and the UK government (through Defra) to implementing the Birds and Habitats Directives, and the value that the English public is getting from its statutory nature conservation body.
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