NatureScot recently asked stakeholders to express views regarding their experience of the licensing processes, to date, for the use of trained dogs in fox population control.
Here we present, for members, our full response to the review.
What we said
We wish to make general comments on behalf of our members, who will comprise a considerable percentage of applicants to date.
Where we make specific points, this is because we have been directly contacted by members seeking to inform us of their experience and passing on information they feel is relevant.
In this response, we wish to restrict comments to applications for environmental benefit.
Comment 1: Our members have told us that, due to the complexity of the process, that they simply would not be able to complete a licence application without significant administrative and technical help. Given the amount of detailed information required, the process would appear to be beyond many practitioners who, ultimately, are often those which require them most.
If this is indeed the case, then the application process for environmental benefit licences, as it stands, is acting as a barrier to those seeking to manage foxes- where other methods would not work- to bring about an environmental benefit.
MSPs in both the Rural Affairs Committee and in the Parliament, and the Minister, when passing the Bill, were very clear in the view that the licensing process should be ‘workable’ for those who needed it.
The process, at the moment, is not and there needs to be an effort to streamline or simplify the process, with Ministers and impacted stakeholders, to bring it in line with what applicants could appropriately be asked to provide.
In all other areas of public policy, there is a need to develop processes which enable people to be able to access important information which effects them, in a clear manner that does not discriminate.
We know of one initial, detailed application which extended to 15 pages, before NatureScot asked for further information.
Some of the skills required to complete an application, which would stand any chance of success, are digital mapping skills and experience in ornithological surveying and the presentation of such information. These are effectively professional, specialist skills which can be jobs in themselves and are largely outwith the practitioners’ traditional daily skillset.
Comment 2: Our members who have applied feel that, process aside, there is an over-riding lack of willingness for environmental benefit licences to be issued. The SGA recalls, during the passage of the Bill, that MSPs and the Minister acknowledged that the bar was higher for these licences.
This is accepted but when it comes to how applications would enable the legislation for environmental benefit, the high evidential bar would appear to translate to virtual impossibility.
As an example, we know of one applicant who, when addressing the key licensing test of whether all alternative methods had been tried and had failed, was asked if snares had been set around woodland blocks.
Given that it was already known by the time of application that the Parliament was to ban snares (understandably causing snare operators to lift all existing snares to remain legally compliant) the applicant justifiably felt this was an unreasonable ask in the circumstances, suspecting that it may have been an opt-out for the licensing team to excuse them from granting a licence.
This should also be read alongside the fact that the application was for the period between Feb and March but was not actually processed- and rejected- until 22nd March, rendering the activity largely pointless. NatureScot’s licensing team will have been aware that the applicant would not have been able to use the licence applied for and explanations should be given as to why a rejection would take so long, leaving teams of people hanging on and management and operational plans in disarray. For practitioners, this is not acceptable.
The SGA is well aware of scrutiny on these licences and the pressure NatureScot may feel. We note recent publicity on this but there needs to be a better balance struck between ensuring granted applications won’t end up in court, and ensuring those who are legitimately trying to protect extinction-threatened species can do so, in an effective manner.
We have no shortage of livestock in Scotland. We are pleased that applications for livestock are being processed, where legitimate and needed.
That said, processes need to be reviewed when we cannot protect species which are globally rare, from the very well researched impacts of forest edge predation (see second image, above, and ground-breaking research from Estonia:
This is particularly relevant given the loss of the snare and the central policy direction of continuing to introduce more new woodland into landscapes currently favoured by some of these keystone species.
In Summary:
Signed, the Committee of the Scottish Gamekeepers Association
September 2024.