Of course I participated in the e-action like 84,000+ others but I also dropped my MP a line to warn him that I’d rather he didn’t send me the nonsense that other Conservative MPs were sending out at the time.
This afternoon I received this response with which I am entirely content insofar as Mr Pursglove has forwarded by email to DEFRA for a proper response (something that many Conservative MPs seem to be trying very hard to avoid doing) and that he addresses my other points. And all done with good humour and politeness. Apart from having a Labour MP I couldn’t ask for anything more from my MP and I am outvoted on that subject so I’ll have to put up with it. Hat tip to Mr Pursglove. That’s how an MP should behave and that’s how he does behave.
Dear Mark,
Thank you for your email.
In relation to your email of the 8th August 2020 in respect of illegal killing of Hen Harriers and other birds of prey, in order to ensure that Ministers are aware of your concerns and to provide you with an official and fully informed response, further to your correspondence, I have today written to the Rt. Hon George Eustice MP, Secretary of State for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, asking him to review your concerns, and to let me have his thoughts on the matters raised at the earliest opportunity. I will of course forward to you a copy of any response that I receive.
I am sorry to hear that you have read insubstantial responses from other MPs, but as I have said above, I am happy to raise your concerns with Ministers directly to obtain an official, accurate and up-to-date response to the various points you have posed.
If you are referring to the policy and campaign replies that I post on the like-named tab on my website, these are informed by parliamentary briefings that we receive on various topics, including through the Parliamentary Resources Unit (PRU) that I am a subscriber to.
In reference to your stated correspondence of the 30th October 2019 at 11:26, unfortunately I have no record of this on my system. Perhaps this could have been lost in transit? If you would like to re-send your request I would gladly consider it.
Finally, in response to your final point, please be assured that every donation that Corby & East Northamptonshire Conservative Association receives is checked as being permissible and registered in accordance with the law, and this is entirely in line with the important democratic principle that British citizens are free to donate to UK political parties.
Once again, thank you for having taken the time to contact me and if I can ever be of any further assistance to you then please do not hesitate to contact me again.
With best wishes,
Regarding good and bad responses to the e-action, I saw on a facebook page today that someone received the following response from her MP:
“Thank you for your email regarding protections for hen harriers and I apologise for the delayed response.
It is currently an offence to kill, injure or capture wild birds, including hen harriers, under the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981) so any such activities would constitute a crime and are therefore a police matter.
I was pleased to see substantive action being taken by North Yorkshire Police in cooperation with the RSPB and Yorkshire Dales National Parks in the launching of Operation Owl, which carries out continuous surveillance work with landowners and trains locals to spot poisoned bait and traps. Volunteer driven schemes such as this raise awareness of these vital causes and must be encouraged elsewhere.
Additionally, Natural England has recently received a budget increase of approximately £15 million, which it plans to invest in the delivery of wildlife licenses allowing the shooting of predatory mammals causing extensive harm to wild birds and their chicks. Stoats are known to cause particularly great damage to wild bird populations and therefore a new General License (GL38) was introduced on 1st April to address this. These licenses should help to alleviate some of the pressures on wild birds such as the hen harrier.”
That last paragraph is breathtaking in its ignorance/dishonesty. One thing we can be pretty confident of is that killing more stoats in not the answer to restoring hen harrier populations!