Thriving grouse moors are ‘success for conservation’
RURAL areas without grouse moors have vanished under “alien trees” or wind farms, the former environment secretary has said ahead of the Glorious Twelfth today.
Owen Paterson said that Britain’s moorlands were a “spectacular conservation success” that government quangos and conservationists wanted to destroy because they were “jealous”.
He pointed to the thriving birds and biodiversity on managed moorland compared with the oversubsidised and “disfigured” landscapes on other uplands as evidence that the shooting industry had “got this issue right”.
His comments emerged before the first day of the shooting season today. It is expected to be a slow start this year, with bad weather during the hatching season meaning fewer birds.
Mr Paterson, the Tory MP for North Shropshire, said that was only one of the hurdles landowners had to overcome. In the foreword to Moorland Matters by Ian Coghill, published in May this year, Mr Paterson said that uplands were a “unique example” of privately funded environmental “protection and enhancement” and yet were under “constant assault” from environmental pressure groups.
Mr Paterson said that estates had resulted in rare birds breeding “in abundance” and a gain in biodiversity as well as economic benefits for the local community.
“Where there are no grouse moors, the hills of northern England and southern Scotland have vanished beneath silent monocultures of alien Sitka spruce trees, grown at a taxpayer-subsidised loss, or turned to low-diversity acid grassland by overgrazing with subsidised sheep, or disfigured by vast steel towers to support huge wind turbines that kill rare birds with their fast turning tips,” he said.
During his time at Defra, Mr Paterson said, he was “acutely aware” that the issue of conservation was “owned” by wealthy environmental pressure groups who “often frankly instructed” officials who worked in quangos regulating the countryside.
“I tried to challenge this alliance between activists and civil servants and to bring science, scepticism and not a little economic reality to their thinking. It was uphill work,” he wrote.
An academic study this week found that grouse shooting had positive “ecological, economic, and social” effects that would not be replicated by other activities on uplands in Britain.
A Defra spokesman said: “While the government has no current plans to carry out a review of the management of grouse moors, we recognise that it is vital that wildlife and habitats are respected and protected, and that the law is observed. We will continue to work to ensure a sustainable, mutually beneficial relationship between shooting and conservation.”