Evidence session at 2:15pm

bob_dylan_barcelona
Bob Dylan, Nobel Laureate Photo: Stoned59 via wikimedia commons

 

Come senators, congressmen please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
There’s a battle outside and it’s ragin’
It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a’ changin’!

The Times they are a Changin’ by Bob Dylan.

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25 Replies to “Evidence session at 2:15pm”

  1. Well done Mark. Whatever the outcome you are doing nature proud. Like Bob said “The times they are a-changin'” – changin’ for the better of our natural heritage. It has been and continues to be a long, long battle but the fortress for nature is well and truly past the planning stage. Your hard work will surely see the fortress planning given permission and allow our precious nature to live life according to its very nature.

  2. Dylan was quite a campaigner, wasn’t he? – an eco-zealot perhaps?. His song ‘Hurricane’ really shows how much he cared. Maybe this is what really got him the Nobel Prize for Literature – a heart-rending tale of innocent moorland folk. . .

    Hurricane – Bob Dylan

    Shot guns ring out in the moorland night
    Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall
    She sees the Hen Harrier in a pool of blood
    Cries out “My God they killed them all”
    Here comes the story of the Hurricane
    The game manager the authorities came to blame
    For something that he never done
    Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
    The champion of the moors.

    Three raptors lying there does Patty see
    And another keeper named Bello moving around mysteriously
    “I didn’t do it” he says and he holds up his hands
    “I was only burning heather I hope you understand
    I saw them flying” he says and he stops
    “One of us had better call up the cops”
    And so Patty calls the cops
    And they arrive on the scene with their blue lights flashing
    In the hot Caledonian night.

    Meanwhile far away in another part of town
    Mike Osbourne and a couple of toffs are driving around
    Number one contender for the grouse moorland crown
    Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
    When a WCO cop pulled him over to the side of the road
    Just like the time before and the time before that
    In Scotland that’s just the way things go
    If you manage grouse moors you might as well not shown up on the street
    ‘Less you wanna draw the heat.

    Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap from the cops
    Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowling around
    He said “I saw two men running out from the heather
    They jumped into a white Landy and made off, hell for leather”
    And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head
    WCO Cop said “Wait a minute boys this bird’s not dead”
    So they took it to the vets
    And though this bird could hardly see
    They told it that she could identify the guilty men.

    Four in the morning and they haul Osbourne in
    Take him to the vets and they bring him upstairs
    The wounded ringtail looks up through its one dying eye
    Squawks: “Wha’d you bring him in here for ? He ain’t the guy !”
    Yes here comes the story of the Hurricane
    The man the authorities came to blame
    For something that he never done
    Put in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
    The champion of the moors.

    Four months later the moorlands are still in flame
    Osbourne’s down in South Yorkshire fighting for his name
    While Arthur Dexter Bradley’s still in the raptor-killin’ game
    And the WCOs are putting the screws to him looking for somebody to blame
    “Remember that murder that happened up on the moor?”
    “Remember you said you saw that four-by-four?”
    “You think you’d like to play ball with the law?”
    “Think it might-a been that grouse manager you saw running that night?”
    “Don’t forget that we are right”.

    Arthur Dexter Bradley said “I’m really not sure”
    WCO cops said “A boy like you could use a break
    We got you for the carbofuran job and we’re talking to your friend Bello
    Now you don’t wanta have to go back to court – be a nice fellow
    You’ll be doing society a favor
    That sonofabitch is brave and getting braver
    We want to put his ass in the stir
    We want to pin this triple raptor murder on him
    He ain’t no Gentleman Jim”.

    Osbourne could take a brace out with just one shot
    But he never did like to talk about it all that much
    It’s my work he’d say and I do it for pay
    And when it’s over I’d just as soon go on my way
    Up to some paradise
    Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
    And ride a horse along a trail
    But then they took him to the courthouse
    Where they try to turn a moorland man into a mouse.

    All of Mike’s cards were marked in advance
    The trial was a circus – he never had a chance
    The judge made Osbourne’s witnesses poachers from the slums
    To the ecozealots who watched, he was a revolutionary bum
    And to the BASC folks he was just a crazy nigger
    No one doubted that he pulled the trigger
    And though they could not produce the gun
    The DNA said he was the one who did the deed
    And the all-white jury agreed.

    Mike Osbourne was falsely tried
    The crime was raptor killin’ – guess who testified
    Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
    And the Times newspaper, it went along for the ride
    How can the life of such a man
    Be in the palm of some fool’s hand ?
    To see him obviously framed
    Couldn’t help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
    Where justice is a game.

    Now all the criminals in their tweeds and their jackets
    Are free to rear red grouse and make themselves a packet
    While Mike sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
    An innocent man in a living hell
    Yes, that’s the story of the Hurricane
    But it won’t be over till they clear his name
    And give him back the time he’s done
    Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
    The champion of the moors.

    (with apologies to Bob Dylan https://youtu.be/gGMSfiH850o)

    1. Nick

      Amazing!! Made me smile, and I could certainly hum along to it. Thank you very much. Outstanding.

  3. Best of luck 🙂
    “Don’t let them win
    Don’t them drag you in
    Shout above the noise”

  4. Just watched your evidence, Mark. Didn’t stay for the bullshitfest that followed. Well done for putting Hart and his ventriloquist’s dummy Sunak in their place “If I have your attention”. Predictably, a distinctly lopsided committee seemed intent on wasting your allotted time by deliberately dwelling on the burning/flooding issue. Sad to say Jeff Knott came over like a “rabbit in the headlights”. Passionless, and somewhat apologetic.

    1. Coop – well, I thought Jeff did very well actually. I felt I could have done better but we got the points across I feel.

    2. I don’t think that is really fair on Jeff Knott. I thought that he and Mark complemented each other well despite having different positions on the solution to the problem(s).
      With respect to the pro grouse shooting side’s evidence session it was a pity that the committee did not really challenge the suggestion that in the absence of DGS the uplands would inevitably be covered in sitka spruce plantations.

    3. Very harsh Coops.

      I thought Jeff Knot handled himself well and showed admirable composure, as did our host. Both Mark and Jeff articulated their arguments very well, especially given the partisan questioning of several committee members. Perhaps you would have preferred Jeff to have started ranting and banging his fists on the table ?..

  5. I accept all your well-made points, gents. I could have chosen my words better. I think I let my anger at the biased committee get in the way.
    However, I still think that Jeff’s stance on licensing watered down the argument considerably, and provided the committee with an excuse to portray the case for a ban as extreme in comparison. After all, this evidence session was (correct me if I’m wrong) convened in response to Mark’s petition, which didn’t refer to licensing. Also, despite his initial assertion of the RSPB’s neutrality, he seemed, at times, to openly contradict that position with some quite pro-shooting statements. Surely, if the RSPB (of which I’m a proud member) wishes to be seen as truly neutral, then it shouldn’t have an opinion either way on the legitimacy (or continued existence for that matter) of “sport” shooting?
    Personally, I think Jeff was trying a little too hard not to antagonise an already hostile jury, when (in my opinion) there was nothing to be lost with a more forceful approach.

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