comment from Sunday Herald, 16 January 2011
Birds of prey are genuinely awe-inspiring. Fierce, majestic, violent and beautiful, they compete with humanity at the top of the food chain, sometimes winning and sometimes losing.
They often infuriate landowners because they eat grouse chicks, leaving fewer for tweed-clad shooting parties to bag. So some lairds covertly allow them to be illegally killed - in their thousands according to the expert reports uncovered by the Sunday Herald today.
Most people would agree that this is a disgrace that shames Scotland. But the problem is this: what can effectively be done to stop it? Previous legal remedies, which have sought to get tougher and tougher, so far seem to have failed.
Proving that named individuals are responsible for killing specific birds on remote hillsides is difficult, particularly when much of the killing can be done in the dark without leaving any traces. A new approach is required.
The Scottish government has shown itself willing to give new ideas a go, by backing a law of ‘vicarious liability’, which seeks to hold landowners responsible for the wildlife crimes on their estates. But on its own, this is unlikely to have much impact, as it will be as hard to enforce as earlier laws.
In an attempt to remedy this, the Labour MSP, Peter Peacock, has put forward a plan that would see guilty landowners named and shamed in the Scottish Parliament. If they then failed to change their ways, they could have their shooting rights removed.
This is aimed at hitting the landowners where it might really hurt: their reputation amongst their peers and their pocket. That seems to us to be worth trying, and if it leads to more eagles and harriers soaring over the glens, we’ll all be the richer.
I would like to contact Mr Edwards with information regarding Faslane. Can you please send me on his e-mail address?
Posted by: John Connor | 09 February 2011 at 11:59 AM