We're delighted that a letter written by Moorland Association Chief Executive Andrew Gilruth has been featured in the latest edition of The Times 'Sir, The year in letters'.
The letter was written in response to revelations that a scheme, operated by RSPB, NatureScot and Orkney Island Council, to eradicate stoats in Orkney had removed only 5,600 stoats so far and that significant additional funding may be needed to complete the job.
Stoats eat the islands’ native voles, (which in turn provide food for raptors including hen harriers), and prey on ground-nesting birds such as curlews and Arctic terns. The eradication project has branded the invasive species “a serious threat to the islands’ native wildlife and economy”.
The letter reads as follows:
Sir,
It took 24 professional trappers only nine years to eradicate 34,000 non-native coypu from East Anglia in the 1980s (“Halt £16m scheme to kill Orkney stoats, urge insiders”, Jan 2).
By contrast, environmental organisations and statutory bodies with a public grant many times bigger have removed only 5,600 stoats on Orkney since 2019 with no end in sight.
The key difference appears to be that the coypu project knew it would end after 10 years, whatever the result, and that if the trappers were successful they would get a bonus of up to three times their annual salary, declining as the 10-year deadline loomed.
Perhaps it is time for the Public Accounts Committee to ensure taxpayers are still getting value for money from current conservation projects.
