Hares: Close Season

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

Absolutely, I can confirm that. The idea is to bring in a close season in line with those of other countries, not to stop control of hares absolutely.

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, I declare an interest in that I farm organically in Scotland and we have a number of hares around. In fact, when the close season came in in Scotland, it did not really do much to help the hare population, because there are enough foxes around to kill the hares, which I have tried but failed to do something about. What really helps is the creation of new habitat, and the Scottish version of the ELMS system has been very helpful in creating habitat for the hares. Can the Minister comment briefly about how ELMS could affect the habitat of hares?

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

ELMS and the sustainable farming work that we are doing are designed to increase biodiversity in habitats and to help support the kind of habitat that the noble Earl is talking about. We are also looking at how we can best tackle things such as invasive species, which have a huge impact on our natural biodiversity. I am very keen that we work together on these things, because you cannot do things in silos. You have to bring things together if you are going to get the best result possible. I am sure the noble Earl would say that that was the same for red squirrels.