RSPB statement in response to judgment on its challenge to the Ribble Gull Cull decision

An application by aerospace company BAE Systems to cull 1100 lesser black-backed gulls in Lancashire has been the subject of a High Court appeal. Judgement was received this morning and the RSPB's challenge was unsuccessful. Here is our response to Mr Justice Mitting’s judgment on the RSPB’s Ribble Gull Cull challenge:

This judgement is deeply worrying as we believe it fundamentally misinterprets the law as it relates to protecting birds. It is important to stress that the dispute at the centre of this case is not about air safety – the RSPB fully accepts the risk exists and that the cull is necessary, this is about how the Government can sanction the killing of an additional 1100 lesser black-backed gulls without acknowledging the damaging impact of removing almost a fifth of the breeding population of a species on a protected site.  The judge appears to condone the Government writing off part of why the Ribble Estuary is important for nature conservation without compensation measures and, as such, sets a deeply disturbing precedent for our most important sites for wildlife – we are urgently looking at our options to appeal this judgment.

We shall making further statements in due course. More information about the case is shown below...

The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has directed Natural England to consent British Aerospace Systems a licence to cull 552 pairs of breeding lesser black-backed gulls in the Ribble and Alt Estuaries Special Protection Area, as they pose a threat to air and public safety relating to the operation of British Aerospace’s Warton aerodrome.  This is in addition to existing consents to cull 500 pairs of Herring Gulls and 200 pairs of lesser black-backed gulls at the same site.  British Aerospace had explored all possible non-lethal alternatives to reduce the risk to air safety and the RSPB understands that, in this instance, a cull is necessary to reduce the risk to a safe level.

However, the RSPB is extremely concerned about how Defra has taken its decision and its implications for the UK’s wildlife.  While the RSPB recognises the air safety risk, we believe the Secretary of State’s conclusion was based on a fundamental misunderstanding of wildlife protection designed to conserve the UK’s best wildlife places.

The RSPB strongly disagrees with the Secretary of State’s interpretation that it is acceptable to lose up to a fifth of a protected site’s breeding bird population without it damaging the conservation value of that site.  Given the very worrying precedent for this and similar sites across the UK the RSPB challenged the Secretary of State’s decision.