Les Wallace’s epetition, having secured over 10,000 signatures, was entitled to an honest, serious and lucid response from Defra but it failed to get one. We know that these responses are signed off by government ministers and we assume that this one was signed off by the minister responsible for the areas covered by the question, Therese Coffey. The Defra response was, yet again, risible as far as actually answering the questions posed – the answer for which Therese Coffey is responsible is evasive and, frankly, insulting to the public. It is the latest in a long line of responses which suggests that Defra really doesn’t care whatsoever about the evidence-based approach which they claim to have, doesn’t care whatsoever about the petition system which was brought in by parliament but does care about the unsustainable and damaging grouse shooting industry and is quite prepared to spout nonsense in its defence.
Let’s just look at that government response in more detail, remembering that the successful petition asked for an independent economic assessment of the impacts of grouse shooting on the economy. Here is the government response with my comments in red.
‘The Government has funded independent reports on this issue including the EMBER Report.‘
The EMBER (Effects of Moorland Burning on the Ecohydrology of Rivers by Leeds University) report and a wide range of other studies are indeed highly relevant to a proper economic evaluation of the impacts of driven grouse shooting but they are not economic evaluations themselves. EMBER looked at what economists would describe as some of the externalities of grouse moor management including reductions in water quality, increases in flood risk, loss of peat, increases in carbon loss, reductions in aquatic biodiveristy – all these things could be assessed in economic terms. That’s the point!
‘We recognise there are differing views on shooting but do not believe it is necessary to fund further research.‘
There are differing views on shooting and one of the areas where opinions differ is on the economic value or cost of intensive grouse shooting on the environment and local communities. Where opinions on the facts of a matter differ it is often because the relevant research has not been carried out or because people have no confidence in its quality, and yet Dr Coffey (yes, remember she has a science PhD) thinks that no further research is necessary.
‘The Government appreciates that many people have strongly-held views on the issue of grouse shooting.’
That’s big of the government.
‘The Government considers that shooting activities bring many benefits to the rural economy and can in many cases be beneficial for wildlife and habitat conservation.‘
I consider that to be true too, up to a point, but I also believe that it is true that shooting brings many costs to the local and national economy which should be assessed and weighed in the balance. This petition is calling for an assessment of the net benefits or disbenefits and Defra is avoiding even addressing that request.
Intensive grouse shooting also has well-known, well-documented harmful impacts on wildlife. This response from government doesn’t sound very impartial already – why does it stress the benefits of grouse shooting so much (though there clearly are some benefits) and ignore the disbenefits completely? And why has the response switched to talking about shooting in general whereas this petiton was about a particular form of shooting only practised in the uplands of Britain and with its own particular impacts on the environment?
Restating that shooting (although it is driven grouse which is the subject of this petition, not shooting in general) has benefits and refusing to acknowledge in this response that there are also disbenefits merely reinforces the need for the study called for in the petition. We don’t expect the grouse shooting industry to admit any of the disbenefits but we should expect government to acknowledge them and to acknowledge the need to weigh them up in a proper appraisal of costs and benefits. This response could have been written by the vested interests of grouse shooting and it is shocking, though commonplace for Defra on this subject, that it sounds like a vested interest in replying to the voters and the public. It is shocking and we should not become accustomed or accepting of it.
‘We also recognise the important (sic) of the ecosystem services provided by the natural environment and are working to protect and maximise these services. We will continue work to ensure a sustainable, mutually beneficial relationship between shooting and conservation.
Protecting upland and associated ecosystem services –
Grouse shooting takes place in upland areas, which are important for delivering a range of valuable ecosystem services, including food and fibre, water regulation, carbon storage, biodiversity and recreational opportunities for health and wellbeing. The Government is committed to helping create a more sustainable future for the English uplands, including by restoring peatlands through development of the UK Peatland Code, which brings in private sector sponsorship from organisations, as well as through Government funded grants.
The Government is aware that the UK uplands have 75% of the world’s remaining heather moorland and about 13% of the world’s blanket bog. 70% of the UK’s drinking water is provided from upland catchments, and tourism brings in an estimated £1.78 billion to England’s upland national parks.
The Government recognises that healthy, active peat provides good habitat for grouse as well as numerous environmental benefits and ecosystem services. Natural England is working with landowners of grouse moors to develop voluntary agreements, which include vegetation management principles for the various habitats on grouse moors. These agreements aim to reverse habitat degradation and help landowners sustainably manage and restore upland peatland habitats. The Government encourages land managers to work closely with Natural England to put voluntary agreements in place for all the benefits they bring to moor owners and to the environment.
To help achieve our policy goals the Government is committed to expanding the understanding of upland ecosystems and the ecosystems services they provide. Helping fund reports like the EMBER report ‘Effects of Moorland burning on the ecohydrology of river basins’ forms part of a wider uplands works programme.’
All the above says is ‘the uplands are important for ecosystem services’ – agreed. This petition asked for those ecosystem service to be quantified and the impacts of intensive grouse shooting on the value of those services to be assessed (and EMBER would be a helpful source of information). Maybe the next paragraph, because we are getting near the end of this response, will say that – let’s see.
‘A report by the UK shooting community (Public & Corporate Economic Consultants report 2014: The Value of Shooting) concludes that the overall environmental and economic impact of game bird shooting is positive; the industry has estimated that £250 million per year is spent on management activities substantially benefiting conservation. For grouse shooting in particular, according to the Moorland Association, estates in England and Wales spent £52.5 million on managing 149 grouse moors for shooting in 2010. Scottish landowners manage a further 150 moors for shooting grouse. The industry also supports 1,520 full time equivalent jobs and is worth £97.7 million across Great Britain.‘
Indeed, that is what the vested interest of the shooting industry says, and what the vested interest of intensive grouse shooting says, but government must know that the PACEC report is flawed beyond belief and surely the government is not simply going to rely on that nonsense? Why does this response not mention the critique of PACEC carried out by economists and academics funded by LACS, a body with a different view of the whole subject? After all, the point of this petition was to ask for a proper independent evaluation of the subject in the public interest. Maybe that will be in the last paragraph of the response because we are nearly there...
‘The Government recognises the benefits that grouse shooting, and shooting more widely, bring to individuals, the environment and the rural economy. The Government therefore continues to support shooting, recognising it is vital that wildlife and habitats are respected and protected and we ensure a sustainable, mutually beneficial relationship between shooting and conservation.‘
That’s it? This amounts to ‘this is an important area where there is a poor non-independent study and the government is going with that rather than doing the job properly’. In fact this official government response, as in many previous responses, spouts the grouse shooters’ side of the argument and fails even to mention the other sie of the argument. Brazen isn’t it?
It is brazen and we should not fail to be shocked by how rude, dismissive and biased this response is. I’ll come back to it later today.
But let’s end by saying ‘Well done Les Wallace!’ for giving Defra the opportunity to move from their untenable position that grouse shooting is an economic and environmental boon. Defra could have edged away from that position but instead chose to side with grouse shooting yet again and make it even clearer that this is not an evidence-based approach but is one which is entirely political.
Another disgraceful response and performance by this Government. This response clearly demonstrates that they support their own vested intrests in grouse shooting and therefore have a totally closed mind to anything that might put facts on the table showing that grouse shooting is a very cruel and damaging business.
In view of the fact that there is now a huge number of people, probably a majority, opposed to this dreadful”sport” one would have thought that the least any reasonable Government should do is to acceed to Les Wallaces’s petition.
We must never give up, but one cannot help reflecting that life will improve a great deal when Ms Coffey and her cronies ar voted out and removed from office.
I agree with the sentiment “well done Les Wallace” and also well done to Mark Avery and RPUK for helping, almost at the last breath, for ensuring that the petition did indeed reach 10,000 signatures, forcing this insulting response.
Mark’s analysis of the response, so far, is well beyond anything most of us could have achieved.
I again ask where were the conservation NGOs who gave this basic, fundamental question almost zero publicity, when it clearly deserved their attention.
The analysis done by Mark here, and his other contributions are shining a light on the inadequate attention being paid to fundamental issues. Is the offer of a seat at table, where they make little impact, enough of an incentive to refuse to help those of us who are able by different means to that which the members of Wildlife and Countryside Link to try to make a difference?
Thanks again Mark, and I look forward to any further contribution you make to this debate.
Anybody that supports DGS is supporting criminals and criminal acts. They are complicit. Dr Theresa Coffey is aiding and abetting.
Well they’ve truly forced us to the nuclear option – ban DGS is all that remains for us to campaign for now.
It’s as plain as punch that the current administration is utterly indifferent to the damage caused by driven grouse shooting. There may well be Conservatives who realise and abhor it’s evils, but they are plainly not running their party. It’s past time that we Libby the opposition parties. Only when this becomes a party political issue will we see progress.
Thank you again to the brave, determined souls who are fighting this battle-all right-thinking folk support you.
One bright spot was that I experimented with contacting ALL the councillors who had email in a council within the Forest of Bowland, they were given the direct link to the petition, one to the guest blog I wrote about it and some more background info on raptor persecution etc. A complete wash out except for one councillor who got back to me saying he was right behind the petition and as he’d read the guest blog he couldn’t possibly have misconstrued its purpose. He was a conservative. Hard to over emphasise the massive buzz I got of that. Increasingly Tory MPs are speaking out against fox hunting, I can’t think of any as yet doing that about driven grouse shooting, but maybe, just maybe that isn’t too far away and that progressive conservative councillor might be a harbinger of the change. The cracks are there, but not yet visible to the public?
We should not have been surprised at DEFRA’s response to Les Wallace’s petition. Those of us who watched on live TV in 2016 how Ms Coffey the DEFRA Minister, and Tory MP’s working in unison all undermined Mark Avery’s e-petition to ban DGS during the debate at Westminster. It’s time we all realise that many in the Tory government, in particular the Minister in charge of DEFRA together with Michael Gove, are indirectly providing support to the widespread persecution of protected raptors on grouse moors by their clear personal support for DGS. Until people like this are removed from their positions of influence within the present government the killing is likely to continue.
You have to wonder if the pitiful nature of these responses is all part of a strategy – a way of signalling distain that they are having to deal with this sort of question. So they deliberately repeat points that have been shown to be flawed and make sure there are a few typos so it’s crystal clear little effort has been expended. It’s a bit like answering ‘no’ to a parliamentary question. Or perhaps it’s just incompetence.
Yes, it’s impossible to avoid the conclusion that they are simply sticking two fingers up at Les and the 10,000 or so people who signed his petition. They know perfectly well that the facts surrounding the overall economic impact of DGS are in dispute so to respond to a perfectly reasonable request for an independent economic assessment by referring to the PACEC report – which they acknowledge to have emanated from the the shooting community – as the last word on the matter requires them to be either astonishingly stupid (which I don’t believe) or arrogantly dismissive of the legitimate concerns of huge numbers of people.
For those unfamiliar with PACEC (2014) it was a BASC commission – not independent as ‘we (Les Wallace)’ were seeking.
A key characteristic of this Government, certainly the worst in my lifetime, is that it is lazy – David Cameron set the tone. Not just that, but it revels in ignorance. There is no attempt whatsoever to win people over – presumably because they realise that the only thing between them and oblivion is the chaos in the Labour party. I am, however, rather surprised that Michael Gove has allowed this to go out effectively over his name – whilst his charm offensive may be shallow he is actually doing some things right in a way none of his predecessors since 2010 (excepting Caroline Spelman) have even tried to.
Thank you once again Mark for your erudite analysis. The response chooses to not discriminate between shooting and DGS because it helps their numbers – the only hint of intellect in the entire response!!
As a petitioner, I wrote to the petitions committee this weekend and have already had their response today.
Can I suggest everyone does the same, for the few minutes it will take. You never know, the cumulative effect might register somewhere in the Gov’t process !!
Alan – I have written too. And I will post my letter here at 6pm.
I was going to write, if that was possible, but assumed that Mark would be doing so. Could you please advise how it could be done, and where any limitations or requirements can be found. I will write my own individual email so that although we all sing from the same hymn sheet, we can put our own emphasis, which may help.
Thank you Mark for such an extensive analysis of this nonsense. My email announcing this response was timed at 0:29 on the 15th; was this an attempt to slip this under the radar? It clearly is written entirely from the shooters’ perspective in fact I wonder who did write it! As pointed out there is no attempt at balance in the response and it certainly does not come close to responding to the petition. Once again we have evidence that either this government is biased or simply doesn’t care!
Stuart – or perhaps both!
Nailed it once again Mark.
Such a pity that it’s Ms Coffey who deals with this. I’d love to know if Mr Gove saw this response before it was issued. Monkey, Organ Grinder and all that. Is there any way of finding out?
Defra are in the pockets of the shooting fraternity . I cant see the point in raising birds just to shoot them . We banned fox hunting because its cruel and a waste of time kill one fox and another will move in same with badgers .
Great analysis Mark thank you. Definitely a rather obvious and I believe calculated two finger salute saying ‘We just don’t care what you think and what are you going to do about it?’. During the petition I tried very hard to get environmental journalists cover this without avail. That’s a pity, because the story here is that rather than being a lifeline for rural communities DGS is a millstone around their necks that’s impoverishing them…..but very, very worst of all the proponents of DGS have always known that, they’ve been lying. Not only wildlife, but people have suffered from this ludicrous hobby. How this could really make its way into the public domain is something I’m thinking about for petition 2 later in the year, unless the petitions committee overturn the decision from Defra in the meantime. I can’t say it enough well done everybody for taking this to the 10,000 plus. Thank you.
Les – you have added your name to the list of petitioners to have had a poor deal from the government on the subject of intensive, unsustainable grouse shooting: Chrissie Harper, John Armitage, myself, Gavin Gamble and Ed Hutchings. Maybe we ought to form a 5-a-side football team (or maybe not).
I’ll play in goal. Though I’m sure they’ll find a slippery enough way of putting one past me.
Ed – good comment
Perhaps, parliament scoffs at perceived anti grouse shooting sentiment thinking “it’ll never get through the Lords!”
The bit about “A report by the UK shooting community (Public & Corporate Economic Consultants report 2014: The Value of Shooting)” is a bit bloody rich. They teach it in GCSE science about weighing the values of certain types of evidence, who funds it being of particular interest. As most people know full well, getting a scientific paper published, usually requires statements about who funded the work and any conflicts of interests of the authors, transparency for all to see. In fairness they have cited the authors here but not the funders and don’t mention BASCs role. The report opens with a brief statement about its purpose and the nature of evidence gathering, actually a crucial point to its impartiality:
“the new research was concentrated around large-scale surveys of the people occupying key roles in organisations which provide shooting sports opportunities (termed “providers”) and shooting sports participants. Participants are people who shoot any type of live quarry across the uK or participate in clay pigeon or target shooting. the purpose of the survey of providers and participants was to look at the employment and monetary flows of those responsible for providing shooting opportunities and those participating in the sports, to assess the direct, indirect and
induced impacts of shooting on the uK economy.
In addition to the economic benefits of shooting, the surveys assessed the environmental and social effects by asking providers and participants questions relating to their shooting opportunities and associated land management practices and the social aspects. the data collected were based on a 12 month
period between August 2012 and July 2013. A total of 16,234 questionnaires were completed, making this the most comprehensive research into the value of shooting ever undertaken in the uK.”
There you have it, hardly impartial and hardly investigating in any way whatsoever the negative impacts.
What’s more, based entirely on the hearsay of people actively engaged in the process, because they like doing it or making money from it.
Of all creatures, man is the most detestable, he is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain.
~ Mark Twain