New Labour pest control

As reported by the Telegraph it seems that pest control should not turn out badly for the pest:

The shooting of woodpigeons and crows may only take place in future only if scaring them has been shown not to work, the Government said yesterday.

...

Countryside organisations were informed by Defra that the wording of the latest general licences, which apply to all shooters, was being changed to read: “This licence can only be relied upon in circumstances where the authorised person can demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable.”

It looks like the caring, sharing, illiberal bias has saturated this particular government department utterly.

I suggest renaming it to pest herding or pest shepherding instead.

The BASC adds that is simply a clarification to show that the general pest license complies with EU law:

The EU Birds Directive protects all birds with two exceptions: “game” shooting, subject to certain conditions such as closed seasons, and pest control under licence where there is no other satisfactory solution. This latter condition has always been implicit in all such licences. The new wording merely makes it explicit in order to show beyond doubt that the general licence complies with European law.

Anyone who has ever been in Italian or Greek shooting party will know how unlikely it is that they, or their government, will take one blind bit of notice of this EU law.

The BASC advises:

“Those who shoot or use traps to control pests do not themselves have to have tried other methods first. In the unlikely event of an authorised person being challenged by the police he would simply have to state that what he was doing was a contribution to crop protection and cite the extensive literature that demonstrates non-lethal methods to be ineffective and impracticable. He might also add that the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs states in the opening paragraph of the licence “that there is no other satisfactory solution”.

I am sure most shooters can cite the extensive literature. Indeed I myself, only yesterday, spent a good few hours refreshing myself on the subject matter.

Simon Hart adds:

Even by DEFRA's standards Tuesday's announcement of new far-reaching conditions to the Open General Licences, which allow the killing of a number of avian pests including pigeons and corvids, was spectacularly stupid. Less than eight hours before they were due to come into force at midnight on 1st March DEFRA published the new licences to a limited circulation. It became clear that without consultation, and despite the warnings that had been eminating from the Alliance and others for some months, they had chosen to insert a new condition stating that the licences: "can only be relied upon in circumstances where the authorised person can demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable".

All wild birds are protected under the EU Wild Birds Directive. Previously it had been accepted that Open General Licences were issued specifically because the Government was satisfied that there was no other practical solution to a national pest problem other than culling. But at a stroke DEFRA has jettisoned responsibility for justifying the management of such species and placed the onus for demonstrating that ‘non-lethal methods of control are either ineffective or impractical' on individual shooters.

Yesterday DEFRA was desperately backtracking saying: "These exemptions and conditions have not changed in substance as a result of the new general licences". This is clearly nonsense. There was no condition in previous licences about 'non-lethal' alternatives and our legal advice is clear that the new condition is a significant restriction on shooting and makes many forms of pest control completely impractical. The situation does not need spin, either from the Alliance or DEFRA. The new condition means exactly what it means. Every time you kill a crow, magpie, feral pigeon or woodpigeon, among other species, you will have to be able to "demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable".

In practical terms this is of course unworkable and, as with other DEFRA diktats, will be largely ignored. But it is the law and however ridiculous it might seem you could now be arrested and charged for shooting pigeons if you cannot fulfil the condition. Our advice is to be aware of the licence conditions under which you may shoot pest species and be prepared to argue that general culling is the only practical method of control. This is not guaranteed to protect you, but should ward off any but the most malicious prosecutions.

DEFRA got itself into this mess by failing to consult properly on its proposals and has completely ignored the Government's own Code of Practice on consultations. The Alliance has already lodged an official complaint about this, and is also working with the NGO, CLA and other organisations to bring a level of sanity back to the open licence system.

Posted by John at March 2, 2005 01:16 PM | TrackBack