Defra Cannot Ignore the Value of Recreational Game Shooting: Our Letter to The Telegraph
- Rob Beeson
- 7 hours ago
- 1 min read
Sir - Patrick Galbraith’s article (“Pubs and tailors in the crosshairs as Labour targets a countryside tradition”, Business, April 7) rightly highlights the economic consequences of Labour’s Land Use Framework.
More serious still is its failure even to acknowledge the conservation value of recreational game shooting. Only last month, Professor Ian Newton, former chairman of the RSPB, told a parliamentary meeting that some English grouse moors hold more curlew than the whole of Ireland.
That is no accident, but the result of active management: habitat, food supply and protecting ground nesting birds from predators. These are real outcomes, not nostalgic claims.
Driven grouse shooting is one of the world’s most successful conservation stories, and at no cost to the taxpayer. We estimate that replacing the effort required to maintain curlew populations alone would cost £1.3 billion over 10 years. The full range of benefits would cost more still. If Defra chooses to ignore that, the Treasury should not. Ministers are under a legal duty to halt species decline by 2030.
Disregarding successful private conservation makes that task significantly harder and more expensive.
Andrew Gilruth
Chief Executive
The Moorland Association
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