Grey squirrel law scrapped: Ministers finally revoke 1937 legislation that made failure to report presence of rodent on your land a criminal offence Law was designed to help eradicate grey squirrels Grey squirrels carry a virus than kills their red counterparts There are now fewer than 15,000 red squirrels left in England Law has been dropped because grey squirrels are now so entrenched By TAMARA COHEN, POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT PUBLISHED: 01:07, 19 March 2014 | UPDATED: 01:07, 19 March 2014 37 shares 29View comments If a grey squirrel is quietly foraging in your garden, you may, unknowingly, have broken the law. Ministers have conceded defeat in the battle against grey by scrapping a little-known piece of legislation which makes it an offence not to alert the authorities if you find one on your land. Enacted in 1937 in an effort to halt the advance of the invasive creature, it attached a stiff penalty of £5 - £295 in today’s money - for failure to ‘give notice to the relevant department’. That way, a man from the ministry could turn up and dispatch the alien grey pest in order to protect the native red squirrel population. +3 +3 There are now fewer than 15,000 red squirrels in England, compared to more than 3 million grey squirrels Perhaps not surprisingly, the Environment Department (Defra) admits it has not taken any calls in recent years - and with numbers of grey squirrels now in the millions, it now has been announced the law will be taken off the statute books. Groups dedicated to protecting the British red squirrel oppose scrapping the law - saying ministers should not admit defeat in the battle against the grey squirrel. It is some 140 years since wealthy Victorians released the greys, imported from America as a curiosity, onto their estates and unwittingly let them spread like an epidemic across Britain. More... Shivering squirrel picture taken in a Suffolk park wins British boy, 15, international photo prize Why the long face? Squirrel becomes mane attraction as it gets stuck inside feeder shaped like horse’s head She must be nuts! Schoolgirl strikes up amazing relationship with abandoned squirrel - and allows it to nest in her HAIR The grey carries a virus, which does not affect them but kills native red squirrels. There are now just 10,000-15,000 reds in England, (120,000 including Scotland) but around three million greys. Solicitor-General Oliver Heald told a committee of MPs: ‘The order requires occupiers to report the presence of grey squirrels on their land to facilitate the eradication of that species’. ‘However, it is no longer considered feasible to eradicate grey squirrels, so the requirement to report their presence on one’s land is no longer useful or observed...people will no longer be required to report sightings of grey squirrels on their land.’ +3 Solicitor-General Oliver Heald argued for the removal of the law from the statute books The Grey Squirrels (Prohibition of Importation and Keeping) Order 1937 was proposed by Conservative MP for Lancaster Herwald Ramsbotham who told MPs at the time: ‘There is a very formidable indictment against this animal... The cost of harbouring such an undesirable alien has already been considerable, and is likely to increase, unless we do something about it.’ Janet Wickens of the Red Squirrel Survival Trust, a charity which protects the threatened British variety said she felt ‘uncomfortable’ about scrapping the law. ‘It is nonsense now because who do you report it to, and what do you expect to happen?’, she said. ‘But while I can see the sense of getting rid of it, we said we would prefer it to stay on the books. We didn’t feel comfortable supporting this move because it’s one step closer to accepting an invasive non-native species and giving it the right to live here. ‘If it comes to the point that we are able to reintroduce the red squirrel to certain areas, it would be useful because it would put an onus on landowners to be aware of the need to remove grey squirrels. Once a law is off the statute books, it’s very difficult to get it back on again.’ Chi Onwurah, the Labour MP for Newcastle Central, told Mr Heald: ‘I want the Minister to recognise the fact that red squirrels are still present in Northumberland - I understand that it is the only English county in which there are still red squirrels in significant numbers.’ Yesterday David Bullock, head of nature conservative at the National Trust, said the law had already been superseded by a more recent one - the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 - which lists the grey squirrel as a pest, so it can be culled by someone with a licence and it is illegal to let a captive one loose. Mr Bullock added: ‘They are technically a pest and have to be dispatched, like Muntjac deer and Japanese knotweed. So that’s more powerful than anything from 1937. But in practice we would not expect someone to get rid of one themselves, as grey squirrels bite and spread disease - so it’s best to call the local authority for advice.’ Share or comment on this article 37 shares Read more: dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2583947/Grey-squirrel-law-scrapped-Ministers-finally-revoke-1937-legislation-failure-report-presence-rodent-land-criminal-offence.html#ixzz2wOWaKFqn Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 08:16:21 +0000
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