Natural England (yes, them again) have behaved very peculiarly in not releasing a report by the BTO on impacts of Badgers on birds (see here, here, here and here).
Natural England say I can’t see the report which they cited in another document, and I complained, which meant they had to carry out an internal review. They have reviewed the case, quite slowly, and decided, surprise surprise, that they were right all along. In a matter of seconds I have carried out my own internal review and decided that I was right all along so I shall be complaining to the Information Commissioner when I get a minute.
In a separate response to another request Natural England tell me;
Natural England are quick payers aren’t they? invoice submitted on a Wednesday and paid on tuesday! If only their financial staff were answering their FoI requests we could all get on a lot quicker! No sign here that the report in question was unfinished, draft or in anyway incomplete.
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Aye Mark like the RSPB behaving very peculiarly in not releasing the BTO data from the Peak District Bird survey last year which showed significant rises in every species, notably birds of prey….
Poor BTO never being allowed to have their work published.
Tommy – thanks for your first comment here. I think you’ve got most of your comment wrong, actually. You don’t seem very well informed.
Hi Tommy,
That sounds like good news. Do I take it that you have the data?
If so can you share it please.
Hi Tommy,
This is a revelation! I would be interested in hearing more from you, as I presume you have seen this data or know someone who has?
It is cited as
“Kettel, E.F. & Siriwardena, G.M. 2019. Comparisons of breeding bird population and abundance trends within and outside two
specified areas located in SW England. Report to Natural England. ”
in the BTO’s “The Breeding Bird Survey 2019 incorporating the Waterways Breeding Bird SurveyPopulation trends of the UK’s breeding birds”
perhaps they might issue you the 2019 report instead?
very impressed with the speed of your internal view!
Well done for continuing to pursue this Mark, although you seem to be hitting much the same stony wall that Tom Langton and I did when we pursued this study.
The facts here remain that NE used public money to pay the BTO (very quickly indeed – emergency-level turnaround!) for a report that they have relied upon (then and since: nothing better has been forthcoming) as a rearguard defence in court – a defence against a charge that they failed to perform one of their most fundamental functions as statutory agency.
Public money spent not on a proactive study to check what the impacts might be, but on a retrospective study to try and make the case (from data not at all suited to the purpose) that their procedural failures didn’t on this occasion translate into recorded damage to wildlife.
Why are NE still so cagey about a study paid for out of the public purse? Is it acceptable for the public to be denied access to a study they have paid for, on the grounds that ‘we might try and publish it one day’. Imagine if that happened with, let’s say a public health issue. “We’ve had a study done based on analysis of old records of people coughing and it provides evidence that there’s no risk of Covid transmission from coughing all over your fellow human. This will now dictate covid policy and procedure. But the public will be denied access to this evidence they paid for as we’re trying to find a journal willing to publish this crap. After rather a lot of knock backs, we’re currently in discussions with the Fortean Times”
Come on NE, be a sport! Let the public see what their money was so very rapidly spent on. I’m sure it will put to bed any possible case that removing badgers from in and around protected sites causes ecological disruption and damage.
You have consistently told the court that you have a royal flush and the court bought the bluff. You’ve been duly called to show this hand, but you’re now telling everyone that no-one can see it.
No-one’s buying this crap. Except the tax payer, who bought it with actual money you spent on their behalf in 2018 and surely has a right to see the long overdue goods.
Dominic – I suspect you are right, and the only thing that would dissuade me would be to see the document in question which NE is trying so very, very hard to keep secret. For an innocent man, NE is behaving in an extremely shifty manner.