Open Season for Woodcock

Debate between Jonathan Gullis and Bill Wiggin

Monday 27th February 2023 Westminster Hall

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered e-petition 619615, relating to the open season for woodcock.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Caroline. Mark Avery, Chris Packham and Ruth Tingay from Wild Justice want the opening of the woodcock shooting season to be formally pushed back to 1 December each year. The current season is 1 October to 31 January, and the season in Scotland starts on 1 September. Wild Justice wrote to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Northern Ireland authorities in March but is yet to receive a substantive response. The petition has received 107,916 signatures, including 76 from the Stoke-on-Trent North constituency, which demonstrates its considerable support across our United Kingdom.

There is no doubt that the resident British woodcock population is not doing well. The Staffordshire Wildlife Trust does great work in my constituency and is dedicated to protecting some of our most beautiful natural wildlife. Woodcock is the only species of wading bird in Britain and Ireland that is adapted to breed in woodland areas. The British Trust for Ornithology, or BTO, describes it as a “superbly camouflaged” bird with a habit of remaining motionless unless approached at very close quarters. There are two distinct populations of woodcocks in the United Kingdom: a smaller breeding population that is resident all year round and a much large overwintering population that arrives in the UK from November onwards.

I have held meetings with those on both sides of this debate to ensure that I make balanced and considered points on the matter. I was glad to meet with Mark, Chris and Ruth from Wild Justice, who started the petition. In addition, I spoke with Jeff Knott from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. Both organisations support the measure that the petitioners want the Government to introduce.

I also spoke with Andrew Hoodless and Roger Draycott from the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, or GWCT, who argue that the ban is arbitrary and that the decline in the woodcock population is a result of bad habitats for woodcock and the deer population. Those views are shared by Jak Abrahams from the British Association for Shooting and Conservation and by Tim Bonner from the Countryside Alliance. They believe that parliamentary time would be better spent on debating and scrutinising the Government’s approach to resident deer population management or the proper management of the countryside, so that we can best protect British and Irish woodcocks.

In 2015, the native woodcock was put on the Great Britain red list, highlighting its decline. Wild Justice is determined for the Secretary of State to introduce statutory measures to reduce the shooting season specifically for woodcocks. The woodcock is a magnificent species and a true symbol of the Great British countryside. As the Member in charge of the debate, I look forward to setting out the complex and nuanced arguments surrounding the length of the season and how best to protect the woodcock. Let me be clear: there is no doubt that the native British and Irish woodcock is in decline. The first breeding woodcock survey was undertaken in 2003 and estimated a breeding population of 78,000 pairs in Britain. A survey conducted a decade later, in 2013, found that there were only 55,000 pairs in the UK—a significant decline of 29%.

I will press on and highlight the arguments for and against the motion. I will start by setting out the arguments made by Wild Justice and the RSPB. Wild Justice states that it uses the legal system to get a better deal for UK wildlife, challenge Government decisions in the courts, and campaign for better and stronger laws and policies. With the native woodcock breeding population in sharp decline, Wild Justice suggests that the shooting season should be reduced by pushing the start date back. That would not end the shooting season but simply change when it starts. It is vital to stress that Wild Justice is not looking for an outright ban on shooting woodcocks, but is focused on shortening the shooting season to better protect the native woodcock population.

Despite figures that suggest that the native population has declined drastically, the pro-shooting Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust estimates that 160,000 woodcocks are shot in the United Kingdom each year. At present, the shooting season commences on 1 October in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and 1 September in Scotland, carrying on until 31 January. Wild Justice’s suggestion to push the start date back to 1 December would reduce the number of native woodcocks being shot and therefore help to reverse the tragic decline in one of Britain’s most recognisable birds. Wild Justice argues that the current shooting season dates compromise the native British and Irish population of woodcocks, because until December there is little to no migration of winter visitors from continental Europe and Asia. There is no difference in appearance between a woodcock from a forest in Britain and a woodcock from a forest in Siberia. As a result, the proportion of British and Irish woodcocks being shot is far more significant until the winter migration takes place later in the season.

Therefore, the petition put forward to us today seeks to get the Secretary of State to exercise their power to vary the close season for the woodcock. Wild Justice and the 107,000 signatories to the petition argue that that would drastically help our native birds. Importantly, it would not require primary legislation. In Great Britain, the Secretary of State has the power to vary the close season for woodcock. Similarly, in Northern Ireland the Minister has the same power to vary the close season for woodcocks there.

While conducting research for this important debate, I met Jeff from the RSPB, as I said. He argued that the concept of voluntary restraint, which the shooting lobby uses as an ostensible rationale for protection of the current season, is highly ineffective. Voluntary restraint is used by some shooting organisations to protect this majestic bird. Rather than requiring statutory measures to protect woodcocks, organisations regulate themselves and either completely prohibit shooting woodcocks or follow the guidance laid out by Wild Justice. Jeff discussed a joint statement from February 2020 in which nine shooting organisations called for a voluntary phase-out of the use of lead in ammunition within five years. Despite there being ostensible support for the statement, the SHOT-SWITCH research project showed that by 2022, 99.5% of pheasants for human consumption that were bought from retailers across the UK and from which shotgun pellets could be recovered had been killed using lead ammunition.

[Sir Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is doing a very good job of being fair and putting the argument across. The first thing to say is that the plural of woodcock is woodcock; there is no s. I am sorry to be pedantic, but I just thought it might be helpful. Secondly, the voluntary ban on using lead shot has not been completed yet, so it is inevitable that some lead will still be used.

[Jonathan Gullis]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for correcting my spelling, punctuation and grammar—it is always good, as a teacher, to be clued up on these things, and I have shown that I need to go back to school quite urgently.

I also want to put across the point made to me: actually, we would have expected a much sharper decline in the use of lead shot. Although the RSPB will accept that, to a certain extent, because of covid and lockdown there will obviously be lead shot that still needs to be got rid of—that process will have slowed down—the reality is that it would still have expected a much more drastic reduction than the 0.5% that we have seen. It would argue that the point proves that voluntary restraint is not actually being taken very seriously by those participating. That is why the concern for the woodcock is shared by Wild Justice, which would argue that despite the informal agreement, it has not been carried forward. In fact, in the Shooting Times there has been open bragging about the shooting of woodcock outside of the agreed season, which would lean into this idea that there is currently mistrust in the system, sadly.

The RSPB argues that the lead ammunition survey makes it clear that voluntary restraint is ineffective on this issue and therefore statutory measures must be enforced to protect the woodcock. In addition to the lead ammunition survey, another indicator of the shooting communities’ reluctance to co-operate in voluntary restraint is the article in the Shooting Times, dated 25 January 2023. It clearly celebrates hunters celebrating the woodcock that they have shot in mid-November. Woodcock shooting days are even now advertised online for dates before December. That suggests that there is compelling evidence that woodcock shooting is not voluntarily withheld until December. For the RSPB, it shows that there is a partial or incomplete understanding of when the appropriate time to shoot is.

This is an important point of discussion, as we have already seen. One of the key arguments against a ban, made by those who support shooting, is that the principle of voluntary restraint means that any statutory ban is unnecessary. However, as the lead ammunition survey shows, there is little evidence to suggest that shooting organisations keep to their promises and restrain themselves from shooting woodcock.