The Government looks set to fail in its first major domestic test over its declared commitment to the environment ahead of an upcoming speech by the Prime Minister. A recent PR charm offensive by the energy company EDF extolling the green credentials of its proposals to build the Sizewell C nuclear reactor seems to be swaying government opinion, despite the fact that the project may irreversibly damage one of the UK’s most important and well protected wildlife…
BLOG POSTS
More on the new general licences for England
Farming Today has just covered the new general licences (9mins into programme). Heather Simons gave a good overview of the history and issues. BASC were interviewed and apparently they love dialogue. This is quite a turnaround. In 2019 BASC welcomed the decision (of which we believe they were a part) to rescind the invitations to…
Wild Justice statement on the English general licences
Click here.
News: English general licences, for 2021, published – and they are different
DEFRA has just published the general licences for England for 2021 (helpfully alongside the existing licences which expire on 31 December 2020 so that one can compare and contrast). Click here for ‘conservation’ licences. Click here for serious damage licences. Click here for safety licences. I’m reading them, as are the Wild Justice lawyers.
New English general licences to be published today
It will be very interesting to view the new English general licences which are to be published later today. I honestly have no idea what they will look like. Last week we had a flurry of activity with our lawyers over the Wild Justice legal challenge of the Welsh general licences which goes to court…
Sunday book review – The Ring Ouzel by Vic Fairbrother and Ken Hutchinson
This superb book is the result of 20 years’ study of this one species by two men. I don’t know much about the two authors but they describe themselves as neither professional ornithologists nor academics – they are amateurs in only the best senses of the word. And rather than an amateur study we should…
Sunday book review – The Disappearance of Butterflies by Joseph Reicholf
This book is a great read. We should be grateful that we now have the opportunity to read this book, first published in German in 2018, in English. The author is a distinguished German entomologist. The book’s title is just slightly misleading in that it is not just about the disappearance of butterflies, for two…
Tim Melling – Stoat
Tim writes: I was walking in an area of felled forestry plantation near my home and I heard a funny noise that sounded like a cross between a squeak and a growl. I stood still and watched and this female Stoat appeared from an old brash pile just a few metres away. I stood and…
Saturday cartoon by Ralph Underhill
Press release – RSPB’s Hope Farm
Two decades of nature friendly farming see bird numbers soar more than ten times Nature-friendly farming practices have seen butterfly numbers quadruple, winter farmland bird numbers rise 1,200% and given a massive boost to bumblebees while turning a profit Farmland covers 75% of the UK making it vital in the fight to reverse nature’s decline…