I think that everyone involved in nature conservation is on basically on the same side. People and organisations may have different priorities or perspectives but broadly speaking we all want the same thing: to save nature. So I find the, fortunately very rare, occasions when we fundamentally disagree with another nature conservation body to be both disappointing and upsetting.
Such an occasion has arrived. Today, the RSPB has filed a complaint with the European Commission regarding Natural England’s approach to protecting important habitats in the South Pennines. Below I explain why we have taken this unprecedented step against an organisation that we otherwise hold in high regard.
In simple terms, we believe that a management agreement reached between Walshaw Moor Estate and Natural England, in March 2012, fails to uphold both EU and UK environmental laws for the legally protected, globally rare and very sensitive blanket bog habitats on the estate. Walshaw Moor form part of the South Pennine Moors SAC, SPA and SSSI conservation sites.
But there’s a lot more to it than that. It’s easiest to explain by winding back the clock a few years. Back in 2005, Walshaw Moor Estate was successfully prosecuted by English Nature for building a track and dumping spoil on protected habitat, and the Court ordered the Estate to restore the damage. In 2010, a local bird club, the Calderdale Bird Conservation Group, noticed more damaging activities and contacted the RSPB. We raised concerns with Natural England, who, it turned out, were already investigating unconsented damage, and had started separate legal proceedings against Walshaw Moor Estate to modify old, ambiguous consents which allowed damaging activities such as intensive burning on blanket bog.
Through 2011, the RSPB supported Natural England in its efforts to modify the old consents – this included making a written submission to the Public Inquiry which formed part of the legal action. Natural England also decided to prosecute the Estate on no less than 43 grounds of alleged unconsented damage to European and national protected sites. The sheer number of alleged breaches (track construction across moors including converting a stream to a track, drainage of peat bog, installing grouse butts, damage to habitats from vehicle use), together with the Estate’s previous conviction and lack of a voluntary offer to restore or mitigate the damage, demonstrate the seriousness of the situation.
And then, in March 2012, Natural England and the Walshaw Moor Estate suddenly announced that all legal actions had ceased and that they had come to a settlement. To our great surprise, the settlement included dropping all the prosecutions without any restoration and agreeing to a new consent that allows existing infrastructure (including the tracks, butts and some of the drainage that were the subject of the prosecution) to be maintained, and permits burning of blanket bog to continue.
On the day that the agreement was made public, we wrote to Natural England to try to establish the justification for their action. We then spent the next six months trying to get to the bottom of what happened in order to understand its implications. The clearest conclusion is this: the legal requirement to protect and restore these designated sites has not been upheld by this agreement.
The reasons for it are less clear. Natural England apparently changed their mind about pursuing their legal action to prevent the estate from burning blanket bog, and the price of settlement was, amongst other things, that they dropped all 43 grounds for prosecutions for habitat damage. Why they lost confidence is unclear, because they were mounting a robust defence only weeks before, supported by independent expert witnesses as well as the RSPB.
Whatever the reason, we now have a management agreement which protects better quality blanket bog but allows burning on degraded blanket bog, effectively preventing it from being restored, as required under EU law. And, critically, the 43 grounds for prosecution for damage have been dropped and the agreement does not seek restoration.
But, even given all this, is it really worth escalating our concerns to the European Commission? Shouldn’t we just accept that this is only one estate with a complicated set of circumstances and that everyone has learnt something? Is it worth tying up Natural England and Defra officials’ time for months with another investigation, and the undoubted hit to relationships with some in the upland community that we will take?
Well, we’ve decided that it is.
Because we can’t ignore the neglect of environmental laws; habitat damage has now been normalised on this estate in a way that will prevent vital habitats being restored to function as the carbon and water stores and bog ecosystems they are meant to be.
Because it isn’t just this one estate; Natural England is due to revisit around 100 management consents for moorland habitats over the coming years, and the Walshaw Moor settlement will set an unavoidable precedent to aim low.
Because it’s not just our fight - local community and environmental groups have registered their great concern about the implications of continued habitat degradation on Walshaw Moors for wildlife, water, cultural heritage and flood protection.
Because the UK Government has a number of commitments to restore biodiversity (including its own Coalition Agreement, the Natural Environment White Paper, England Biodiversity Strategy and the 2020 EU and CBD bidoiversity targets) and the Walshaw agreement is inconsistent with these objectives.
And because, over the next few months, Defra will be reviewing their environmental agencies (Natural England and the Environment Agency) and this case underlines how much we need a government agency that is able to exercise its powers to deliver and uphold laws that protect wildlife.
Does this mean that we’re at war with estate managers in the uplands, or with the Government?
No, of course not. Launching a European complaint is a serious step, but it doesn’t change our commitment to supporting the Government and the moorland community in working towards environmental improvements in the uplands.
So disappointed and upset, yes, and a bit angry too, because we had supported a process in good faith only to be cut out and presented with an unacceptable fait accompli. But, my main emotion as we launch our complaint is hope. I hope that this will allow the issue to be examined dispassionately and away from the pressured politics of England’s environment and land use issues, and hope that that will, in the end, result in clearer protection for our most vulnerable habitats, and a stronger hand to play for wildlife’s most important government agency.
More details of our complaint will appear online soon. I shall point you in the right direction once available. In the meantime, a question for you...
...do you think we are we right to complain?
It would be great to hear your views.
We fully support this action. The RSPB is absolutely right to call the government to account and to uphold the international environmental laws that protect our wildlife and habitats. The devastating effect that the destruction of the blanket bog is having on the South Penine Moors SAC,SPA, SSSI conservation sites and the community of Hebden Bridge due to flooding cannot be allowed to continue. Keep up the good work
Conservation and Communities United!
Friends of the North Kent Marshes