I care deeply about the performance of Natural England – the government agency which is supposed to act in nature’s interests. That’s why I am taking a judicial review against their decision to license brood meddling (see here – we had two days in court last week but we need another day and we are…
Category: THE STATUTORY AGENCIES: NE, EA, FE etc
A response from NE
Here is the link to the NE Enquiry Service. On the face of it, it looks like I may have been misinformed, or, in other words, I was wrong. But, it pays to check the wording carefully. Answer 2 seems to say that there is a more accurate or up to date dataset being finalised. …
More from this morning’s Efra Committee and Andrew Sells
The idea of giving an outgoing Chair of a statutory agency the opportunity to reflect on the state of the world is a good one – particularly if they grasp the opportunity , which Andrew Sells did this morning. He went out of his way to talk up vicarious liability and removal of the general…
Asking the burning questions?
Dear Natural England I understand from a member of NE staff that the blanket bog overlay on the MAGIC system is not the most accurate or up to date dataset which NE has on blanket bog extent – can you confirm whether this is true? what plans does NE have to make the more accurate…
Defra/NE dragging their feet again on wildlife crime
If you are aware of the MoU between NE, NRW, the CPS and the National Police Chiefs’ Council then I doff my cap to you. I’ve only recently been pointed in its direction. The document deals with how these organisations should and will work together covering the following areas: purpose of the agreement the parties…
An alternative narrative
Natural England’s answers to some questions about the failure of two Hen Harrier nests on a Yorkshire grouse moor this season were published on this blog this morning. To be fair to NE, they only responded to the questions I posed, rather than giving a full account of events on this grouse moor over the…
Strathbraan Raven cull
Comments Off on Strathbraan Raven cull
An extract from the agreed minutes of the SNH Board meeting held on 20 June. Interesting that the Board pointed to the reputational risk of delaying the publication of the damning SAC report on the lack of science behind the misjudged Raven cull. ‘Towards the end of July’ couldn’t have been much later, it was…
Natural England in a new mess with Hen Harrier data
Natural England published a skeletal version of its Hen Harrier tracking dataset back in September 2017, after years of pressure from this blog and others. Last Saturday it updated that dataset by adding one extra column – of grid references of the last good fixes of Hen Harriers that were known to be dead or…
Our Hen Harrier data
We are going to have to wait a little while or a long while to see the results and findings of the long-awaited analysis of the Hen Harrier satellite-tagging study that you and I (as taxpayers) have funded for many years. However, it already looks as though the findings could be the dynamite to blow…
SNH spin
I’ve been sent this passage from two SNH staff (the versions differ by a few letters and commas – I’ll put that down to transcription errors) – that they say was put out on the internal SNH intranet by their Director of Operations, Nick Halfhide, following the withdrawal by the Scottish Raptor Study Group of…