The first two months – more than 50 with more than 50 signatures

Mark 13 Comments

Gavin Gamble’s e-petition to ban driven grouse shooting keeps making significant progress. On 2 December – that’s two months in and four months to go – it passed 17, 200 signatures and now it’s over 17,600.

Highlights:

  • Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey passed 100 signatures.
  • The number of constituencies with 50+ signatures has jumped from 26 to 51 in the last week.
  • Foyle first, and then Barking attained their first signatures.

Here are the leading constituencies so far – many of them are old friends (all with 50+ signatures):

  1. Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, Drew Hendry MP, 103 signatures
  2. Ross, Skye and Lochaber, Ian Blackford MP, 91 signatures
  3. Westmorland and Lonsdale, Tim Farron MP, 90 signatures
  4. Skipton and Ripon, Julian Smith MP, 87 signatures
  5. Calder Valley, Craig Whittaker, 84 signatures
  6. Sheffield Hallam, Jared O’Mara, 84 signatures
  7. High Peak, Ruth George MP, 83 signatures
  8. Isle of Wight, Bob Seeley MP, 83 signatures
  9. Suffolk Coastal, Therese Coffey MP, 81 signatures
  10. Thirsk and Malton, Kevin Hollinrake MP, 79 signatures
  11. North Norfolk, Norman Lamb MP, 78 signatures
  12. Penrith and The Border, Rory Stewart MP, 77 signatures
  13. Stroud, David Drew MP, 77 signatures
  14. Dumfries and Galloway, Alister Jack MP, 76 signatures
  15. Argyll and Bute, Brendan O’Hara MP, 74 signatures
  16. Richmond (Yorks), Rishi Sunak MP, 70 signatures
  17. Sheffield Central, Paul Blomfield MP, 69 signatures
  18. Wells, James Heappey MP, 65 signatures
  19. South Norfolk, Richard Bacon MP, 64 signatures
  20. Central Devon, Mel Stride MP, 63 signatures
  21. Ludlow, Philip Dunne MP, 62 signatures
  22. Brighton Pavilion, Caroline Lucas MP, 62 signatures
  23. Derbyshire Dales, Patrick McCloughlin MP, 61 signatures
  24. Harrogate and Knaresborough, Andrew Jones MP, 61 signatures
  25. Perth and North Perthshire, Peter Wishart MP, 60 signatures
  26. Ceredigion, Ben Lake MP, 59 signatures
  27. South Cambridgeshire, Heidi Allen MP, 59 signatures
  28. Scarborough and Whitby, Robert Goodwill MP, 59 signatures
  29. Ochil and South Perthshire, Luke Graham MP, 57 signatures
  30. East Lothian, Martin Whitfield MP, 56 signatures
  31. Norwich South, Clive Lewis MP, 56 signatures
  32. Beverley and Holderness, Graham Stuart MP, 55 signatures
  33. Rutland and Melton, Alan Duncan MP, 55 signatures
  34. Somerton and Frome, David Warburton MP, 55 signatures
  35. Ribble Valley, Nigel Evans MP, 55 signatures
  36. South West Surrey, Jeremy Hunt MP, 54 signatures
  37. West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, Andrew Bowie MP, 53 signatures
  38. Arundel and South Downs, Nick Herbert MP, 53 signatures
  39. Lancaster and Fleetwood, Cat Smith MP, 53 signatures
  40. Tiverton and Honiton, Neil Parish MP, 53 signatures
  41. Torridge and West Devon, Geoffrey Cox MP, 52 signatures
  42. Moray, Douglas Ross MP, 52 signatures
  43. North West Norfolk, Henry Bellingham MP, 51 signatures
  44. Bridgwater and West Somerset, Ian Liddell-Grainger MP, 51 signatures
  45. East Yorkshire, Greg Knight MP, 51 signatures
  46. Edinburgh South, Ian Murray MP, 51 signatures
  47. St Ives, Derek Thomas MP, 50 signatures
  48. Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, David Mundell MP, 50 signatures
  49. North Wiltshire, James Gray MP, 50 signatures
  50. Colne Valley, Thelma Walker MP, 50 signatures
  51. Keighley, John Grogan MP, 50 signatures

 

We are now a third of the way through the time – and clearly not a third of the way to 100,000 signatures. But there is plenty of time and we have picked up a bit of momentum over the last couple of weeks. Most of my own effort is planned for 2018.

However, here’s a thing you can do very easily to spread the word – if you are on Twitter, Facebook or Tumblr then please sign up to this thunderclap which will send out a message on 10 December, the last day of the grouse shooting season, that we want this unsustainable hobby to disappear as soon as possible. Thank you.

And don’t doubt that grouse shooters are watching how this e-petition is faring. See this letter in The Field‘s ‘bumper’ Christmas issue. Obviously The Field has a rather different take on the meeting in Chesterfield than most did (and that group of ‘keepers has not taken up the offer of either a debate on the subject or me coming to talk to them, by the way) but it obviously hurts an industry/hobby that claims it is popular that it can’t raise many signatures in its support – which is why signing Gavin Gamble’s e-petition is still quite important.

 

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13 Replies to “The first two months – more than 50 with more than 50 signatures”

  1. And then there’s another pro-grouse shooting petition that Jeff P drew our attention to a few days ago: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/205672
    It currently stands at 8 signatures. The wording of the petition is quite revealing about shooters’ attitudes:
    “Grouse moors and grouse shooting are integral and traditional parts of moorland management which benefit the grouse and ALL native wildlife i.e. Lapwing and plovers. Grouse shooting is supported by the Royal family and real country people.
    Grouse shooting income is essential for local businesses and jobs and should not be banned. Killing vermin is a social service which benefits ALL wildlife. Birds of prey are over-protected and are out of balance with natural habitats and species.”
    ‘Real country people’ simply don’t accept that predators are part of our native wildlife at all.

    1. In terms of lolz it doesn’t quite reach the heights of the “Stone Curlews” and “Countryside Alienate” of the first one.

  2. Mark, I believe Douglas Ross, Moray, is Conservative, if so you’ve painted him the wrong colour.

  4. Do you know if there’s anyway of getting a link to the full Field article? Looks like it may be worth a laugh. For now I’ll content myself with guessing the kind of videos non-shooting types watch on the internet! Could be a good competition in that…
    ….and well done to whoever that Barking signatory is.

  5. Really keen to understand what Gavin Gamble’s strategy is to promote his e-petition. Less than 20% of the required signatures in 30% of the time. The maths don’t quite add up yet if it is going to reach 100,000 signatures. It needs at least a rate of progress of 700 signatures every single day. So clearly it needs to attract far more signatures than that to allow for the likely probability that people will be distracted from this sort of thing over the Christmas period. If you’re reading this Gavin, can you please share what your plan is?

    1. Chris – Gavin has told me that he’ll write a Guest Blog here fairly soon – so he’ll have the opportunity to respond to the situation.

      But, personally, I think there is a realistic chance of reaching 100,000 signatures and a few of us have a few things in mind to help achieve that. It won’t be easy, and I’m certainly not saying that it is likely, but I am sure that it is possible. I reckon February will be the critical month.

    2. Chris, I have not seen anywhere that Gavin set this supposed target of 100,000 whyever should he have a target of that number.No reason whatsoever as it is almost unheard of in number terms of an ordinary person reaching those figures.
      At least he got on and did something while most of us sat on our hands waiting for others to do something.
      This carping about reaching massive numbers does no good at all.For sure he will have done all he can.

  6. I’m curious as to which “facts” you were enlightened with by these helpful gamekeepers, Mark?

    1. Hugh – me too! They seemed mostly to be talking to themselves or arguing with views that weren’t and aren’t mine.

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