Driven Grouse Shooting

Debate between Steve Double and Lord Herbert of South Downs

Monday 31st October 2016 Westminster Hall

[Steve Double]

I agree very much with both my hon. Friend’s points.

Red grouse are not found anywhere in the UK but uplands. They live in heather moorland and heather forms the staple part of their diet. Seventy-five per cent of global heather moorland is located in the UK, so in global terms heather moorland is rarer than the rain forest. Heather moorland comprises about 7% of the UK’s land mass, or some 6,500 square miles.

Grouse shooting comes in two forms: walked-up shooting, which involves groups of shooters who walk around a predetermined area and drive the grouse from the ground, and driven grouse shooting, which involves a group of beaters who scare the grouse from the ground towards a line of shooters. One of the petitions calls for a ban on driven grouse shooting, but as my hon. Friend said, it seems slightly illogical to wish to ban only one form of grouse shooting.

Clearly there are informed and strongly held views that grouse shooting is detrimental to our environment and wildlife. Concerns have been expressed about how the way in which the moors are managed contributes to flooding and is responsible for the destruction of other wildlife, including some of our national birds of prey in particular. I am aware that many other hon. Members wish to participate in the debate, so I will be unable to go into all the detail of the issues raised in the time available to me in opening, but I hope others will pick up on the other points. I will deal with what I see as the main issues.

One of the biggest questions, as I see it, is whether the management of grouse moors is good or bad for our environment. First, we have to look at moorland management and whether the moors must necessarily be managed. Moorland looks wild, but in fact it is a carefully managed environment. It is thanks to grouse shooting that over the past 30 years grouse moor managers in England have been responsible for the regeneration of more than 217,000 acres of heather moorland. The petition to ban mentions that such moorland is an important part of the ecosystem and local habitats, so one of the big questions to be asked is, if we were to ban grouse shooting, how would that important habitat otherwise be managed?

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

I am sorry to interrupt my hon. Friend. Does he agree that the question is not just how this moorland would be managed were grouse shooting to be banned, but whether it would exist at all or instead be given over to belts of conifers or grazed farmland? Surely the existence of the moorland is a reflection of grouse moor management over generations.

[Steve Double]

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point, which I will develop later in my speech, and I agree with him completely.

The management of the moorland for grouse provides the manpower to tackle invasive plants such as bracken and ragwort, along with saplings and shrubs of other species, and keeps the heather moorland clear. That level of intervention would not be viable without the grouse shooting industry. In England, grouse moor owners spend approximately £50 million every year on moorland management; in Scotland, the figure is more than £30 million. If grouse shooting were banned, where would the funds to manage the land come from?

Another concern expressed by those who wish to ban grouse shooting is that it causes flooding. I understand the logic of their argument: grouse moor management can increase the risk of flooding, because burning reduces the ability of the moor to absorb rainfall and run-off must therefore increase, leading to flooding further downstream. I suggest, however, that that is too simple a conclusion and that the issue is far more complex. Indeed, peatland restoration is known to help to slow the rate of water run-off. Ending moorland management as a result of banning grouse shooting might actually make flooding worse and more likely to happen. I am particularly interested in hearing the Minister’s views on that when she responds to the debate, because the issue is of great concern to those who live near such moors.

Another point worth making is that many areas of heather moorland are protected in their current state by their status as SSSIs—sites of special scientific interest. If the tens of millions of pounds of income from grouse shooting were to be lost, how would those protected landscapes be maintained in their current state without the cost falling on the taxpayer, something I simply could not support?