Hedgehog Conservation Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Julian Knight
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Hedgehog Conservation
Julian Knight Excerpts(9 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Oliver Colvile
My hon. Friend has been reading my speech or has had prior notice of it.
Hedgehogs need to move a surprising distance to search for food, mates and nesting sites, so we need to make it easier for them to move between gardens, perhaps by making holes in fences. During a visit to Plymouth’s hedgehog rehabilitation and care centre this autumn, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), I learned that the way to tackle this problem is to stop habitat loss. I was also rather surprised to learn that we should not leave milk and bread out for hedgehogs. Additionally, slug pellets are a great danger that can be fatally harmful to them.
Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. Does he agree that the advent of specific hedgehog conservation areas, such as the one in Elmdon in my Solihull constituency, can play a major part in arresting the alarming decline in the numbers of the great British hedgehog?