Robin Scott
Robin Scott has a case of the heavy-metal blues as he considers the inevitability of the transition from lead ammunition to more ‘sustainable’ alternatives, but questions the presented facts that justify it
As hatchet jobs go, the campaign bulling up the benefits of iron shot and trashing lead pellets is a done deal. Whether we like it or not, sooner not later we’ll be spraying steel balls around the countryside with gay abandon. No amount of shouting or kicking against the traces is ever going to change this orchestrated outcome.
Lead’s demise was a given the moment the sport signed up to a ban for wildfowling 20 years ago. While the anti-lead propaganda peddled back then was bad enough, today it is relentless. And, depressingly, much of it is being generated and fanned by some in our own ranks. The argument is that it’s better we drive the switch to alternatives than have it dropped on us through legislation. That’s all very laudable but, voluntary or otherwise, the end result is going to be the same: a ban on a very effective material for shooting and scrapped guns.
Just cause
Although Man has used lead shot for three or more centuries and survived, maybe it is an evil bigger and more pernicious even than widespread habitat loss that has driven so much of our wildlife to the brink. If so, I will happily bite the bullet, applaud our leaders and switch to steel when my stock of lead dries up. Which won’t be any day soon.
No, my reluctance to join this particular steel band and sing to its tune has been hardened by the stridency of the campaign and the way matters are being orchestrated. Just as it was with the ban for wildfowling, scientists and antis – supported by the unquestioning acquiescence of most representative shooting groups – are firing off statistics in support of a ban that, quite frankly, take a lot of believing.
Back then “thousands of wildfowl needlessly die each year after ingesting spent lead pellets picked up on wetlands”, we were told. Cue action to stop it happening. Yet apparently, more than 20 years later, duck and geese are not only still dying from lead poisoning, according to the stats they are going paddles up on our marshes and flight ponds in even greater numbers than before. How so when only non-toxic alternatives have been deposited on these habitats for almost a quarter of a century? Surely the death rate should be in decline, so why isn’t it? What’s gone wrong?
The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust now tells the Government as many as 100,000 wildfowl die each year in the UK. A further 400,000 (unspecified) birds also “suffer welfare or health impacts” as a result of lead shot. How on earth do they settle on such figures? At the very least the BASC as our representative voice should be demanding proof and an explanation of the methodology being used here. The same goes for the alarming ‘statistic’ from the EU’s chemicals agency that around 150 million birds across Europe die each year for the same reason. At this rate – if the stats are right – it’s a wonder there’s a bird to be seen in the countryside. If the statistics are so accurate, maybe critics will consult their bean counters and predict exactly when birds will disappear from the sky altogether.
More seriously, however, those with a long enough memory probably won’t need reminding that it was a claimed slump in mute swan numbers due to poisoning that resulted in lead fishing weights being banned 30 or more years ago. I was then working on Angling Times and well remember reporting on claims by bird organisations that (thanks to the ban) swan numbers just a year later had miraculously recovered. Call me a cynic, but might there be a similar surge in wildfowl and other bird numbers within a couple of years of a total ban on lead in shooting?
Surely I’m not the only shooter out there who simply asks for a little more transparency and honesty to be shown in this debate? Yet all we hear from groups supposedly looking after our interests is that shooters are showing ‘strong support for a ban’. Really? One has even said its survey (based on just 2,500 replies) reveals a majority intend to move away from lead shot this next season.
Presumably the researchers believe this ‘majority’ when extrapolated across hundreds of thousands of other shooters in the UK will show the same support. They could well be wrong. Most people I’ve heard from suggest the opposite. They’ve tried the alternatives, haven’t been impressed, do not want to change and they’re not frightened of eating game killed with lead shot.
Review
Just maybe the Environment Agency’s (EA) forthcoming consultation and review on lead ammunition will provide some balance before a decision is made but its tone when announcing the inquiry suggests otherwise. It opened by stating: “Evidence shows… a large volume of lead ammunition is discharged every year over the countryside, causing harm to the environment and wildlife” as well as finding “its way into… the food chain, posing a risk to people if they eat contaminated gamebirds.”
So there you have it: the EA is already convinced on the matter – even before its two-year consultation process has been completed. Statistics?
Anyone and everyone with a gripe about lead shot is quick to blame it for the deaths of half-a-million birds here, another million and a half there. But when it comes to the number of lead-ingested deaths and illnesses among humans there’s a deafening silence. I wonder why? Maybe that particular red herring will finally be laid to rest when the EA review gets to the truth through the Freedom of Information Act. Not that it will change a thing. Who among us will be presenting the case for a proportionate and reasonable solution on the future of lead in shooting at the forthcoming review?
What’s needed is a resolution that meets both the needs of commercial interests and shooters. Why not insist on the use of nonlead alternatives for game going into the commercial food chain and leave lead loads for personal consumption? Just a thought.
“Am I the only shooter out there who wants a little more transparency and honesty?”