Warm reception for grouse-shooting call

More grouse shooting would be good for the country, according to the Moorland Association – and its arguments have had a warm reception from the Conservatives' rural team.

The association published a paper and took it to Westminster this week, arguing for restoration of 700 square miles of heather moorland which have been lost in England and Wales over 70 years, thanks mainly to government policies encouraging intensive farming of the uplands – now out of fashion.

The association said heather moors were good for wildlife, good for water and good for their local economies, because they brought in big-spending grouse shooters and provided ideal conditions for low-impact sheep farming in between.

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Land managers could make money out of new grouse shoots on land no longer required for intensive sheep farming or forestry, and had investment waiting.

But Natural England, the conservationist arm of Defra, was getting in the way by laying down too many rules – about burning to manage the vegetation, for example.

The newly fashionable requirement to fill in land drains was also a problem, said the association, because it was being applied even where it created more problems than it solved.

With an eye on debate over the future of Natural England, and the 100m cost of running it, the association suggested

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that Defra could get big results by paying small incentives for restoration of heather moorland and leaving private investors to get on with it, without "the current unnecessary burden of significant government agency involvement in almost every aspect, at a very significant cost to the public purse".

Edward Bromet, chairman of the Moorland Association, is a Leeds-based solicitor and a member of the Bingley Moor Partnership, which runs much of Rombalds Moor and now has a contract to manage the Ilkley Moor portion of it for Bradford Council.

He said: "Ilkley Moor is a very good example. The council banned shooting in 1997 and the moor became over-grazed in some parts and over-run with bracken in others.

"They then realised that the best way to restore the heather and depleted bird numbers was to reinstate grouse moor management."

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Jim Paice, Shadow Minister for Agriculture, said: "Moorland management for red grouse has safeguarded some of our most treasured landscapes and its economic drivers help balance farming, wildlife and use as upland water catchments, to the benefit of us all.

"It should form an important part of the future of the uplands."