Examination of Witnesses (Questions 120
- 139)
THURSDAY 20 MAY 2004
SERGEANT PETER
CHARLESTON
Q120 Sue Doughty: Do you know how
many in North Wales Police have received these?
Sergeant Charleston: Directly
affecting our own force area, I have not had any from NCIS. However,
they tend to use me as a conduit for Welsh matters with other
Welsh forces, and I have received two via them.
Q121 Chairman: Can you tell us whether
the NWCIU is only concerned really with organised crime? That
was the implication of something you said earlier.
Sergeant Charleston: It is organised
crime in that it is cross-boundary, be it national or international.
Q122 Chairman: It does not have a
complete remit; it is dealing with perhaps the more serious end.
Sergeant Charleston: I think a
lot of wildlife crime does not involve the crossing of borders,
and is at the lower level of criminal offending, or organised
criminal offending. NCIS will not generally look at that, but
they are approaching the issue of crime profiles with a very broad
mind, and will look at anything they think may involve organised
activity.
Q123 Paul Flynn: You mentioned in
your evidence that there is an initiative to gauge the scale of
illegal trade in endangered species being conducted through the
Internet. Who is leading this work and how long is it to run for?
Sergeant Charleston: We are aware,
sir, that the Internet seems to be one way of carrying out an
illegal trade in certain endangered species. NCIS are looking
at it, and also Defra to a certain extent, I understand; and likewise
individual police forces and Her Majesty's Customs & Excise.
Q124 Paul Flynn: Can you give some
examples of what is going on in these sites, and can you give
any indication at all about how far NCIS and others have gone?
Sergeant Charleston: Personally,
on the searching of the Internet that I carried out, particularly
Internet auction sites, there does seem to be a trade in relation
to ivory and other derivatives.
Q125 Paul Flynn: One presumes that
if the sites are open and if they have to get through to their
customers to sell the material, it is open to the general public
or anyone else. Surely it is fairly easy to detect the sites and
possibly trace them?
Sergeant Charleston: It is easy
to establish what is for sale, certainly; it is less easy to find
out who is selling it and to react in time to prevent the sale
occurring.
Q126 Paul Flynn: In that paragraph
you make the point about the undetected crime that is going on
and the trade that is going on. Is this a major concern, that
it might be on a scale way beyond what we would expect?
Sergeant Charleston: I think the
research is still very much at an early stage, and I am not sure
we have been able to discover it to an extent where we know how
many crimes are involved. If you go on to one of the larger auction
sites and merely tap in, like I did, "ivory", you would
find many, many lots up for sale. Many of course are legal, but
some are illegal.
Q127 Chairman: We have heard evidence
from the National Gamekeepers' Organisation, which is, not surprisingly,
very concerned about poaching. They have said that particularly
illegal hare coursing is very much on the increase, and up to
70 people, four or five times a week are out doing this in some
parts of the country; and yet they also complain that the rural
police forces say that it is virtually unpoliceable and there
is nothing they can do about it. I would have thought that if
there were 70 people doing it as regularly as that, they would
present quite a big target.
Sergeant Charleston: I am aware
that illegal hare coursing causes a number of police forces problems,
particularly in eastern England; and I am aware that some police
forces have initiatives and operations that have been set up to
combat it. Although there may be large numbers of people and vehicles
involved, I am aware that you do not know where they come from;
they turn up on the ground, use the vehicles and the dogs on the
ground, and are away before the police can necessarily respond.
Q128 Chairman: Presumably, members
of the National Gamekeepers' Organisation or land-owners and farmers
can take down registration numbers and you could follow that up.
Sergeant Charleston: If we had
reports of that, I am sure we would make efforts to follow it
up. It would be very resource-intensive to do so, and often a
lot of people involved in this activity are of no fixed abode;
the vehicles may not be registered to the individual, and I think
there is more work involved in that than would appear at first
instance.
Q129 Chairman: So when we are told
that this illegal and unpleasant activity is unpoliceable, we
are being told in effect the truth!
Sergeant Charleston: It certainly
creates policing difficulties for us, but it is an issue that
a number of police forces have recognised and are making attempts
to combat.
Q130 Chairman: How often have you
been involved in taking action against organised poaching?
Sergeant Charleston: In North
Wales you do not have the problem of illegal hare coursing because
of the geography of the area. Nevertheless, I have problems with
poaching of a different nature, namely deer poaching, where we
are talking about violent criminals visiting our force area and
killing deer. Again, we have a policing operation set up to deal
with it. The legislation as it stands at present in relation to
game laws, and on other issues of wildlife crime, is such that
it is very difficult for the police to be very proactive in the
area. It may be possible to follow up and report people if the
evidence is available, but we do not have the powers to be proactive
against people committing certain offences that may be construed
as wildlife crime.
Q131 Chairman: Would you like to
see the law changed?
Sergeant Charleston: I think the
game laws date back to the 19th century. I understand there is
talk of a review, and certainly the police service would be very
interesting in co-operating in that review.
Q132 Chairman: Can you tell us a
little bit about the penalties that apply if people are prosecuted
and found guilty of offences?
Sergeant Charleston: For game
offences, my understanding is that in the courts nowadays fines
are the normal penalties that are imposed, although I believe
legislation does allow for custodial sentences. However, I am
not aware of such sentences being imposed.
Q133 Chairman: Is there much re-offending?
Sergeant Charleston: I think poachers,
people who indulge in game offences, do re-offend. They look upon
it as their pastime, and first-time offenders or single offenders
are quite common—re-offending, this is.
Q134 Chairman: It sounds as though
whatever the penalties are in place, they are insufficient to
act as a deterrent.
Sergeant Charleston: Yes.
Q135 Chairman: Can I move on to the
next subject of badgers. Your written evidence says that in relation
to protecting badgers the legislation is pretty robust, although
there are certain areas where improvement is needed. One of the
improvements you want to see is more proactive police action.
The National Gamekeepers' Organisation takes a very different
view; they regard badgers on the whole as a nuisance and think
the rules are too restrictive. Who do you think is right?
Sergeant Charleston: The police
service does not have any view on whether or not badgers are a
nuisance. The police service has a view on the offences contained
within the Protection of Badgers Act. When we are trying to address
the problems that are raised by that Act—and the problem
I talk of primarily is one of badger digging, or badger baiting—the
legislation virtually requires us to capture people in the act
of carrying out that activity. If I could draw comparisons for
a moment with the issue of the illegal collecting of wild bird
eggs, there we have powers to go out and get search warrants,
where we can now arrest people and interview them. We can take
the challenge of enforcing the law to people when they are not
actually out committing offences. With badger baiting we have
to catch people committing the offences in order to get a prosecution.
Perhaps, if we had a power to obtain search warrants, we would
be able to target known badger baiters, execute warrants at addresses,
looking for evidence of offences that have been committed in the
past.
Q136 Chairman: In your evidence you
refer to the regulations for protecting European protected species
as being so inflexible that they leave developers, for example,
with an attractive option to commit the offence and not go through
the proper process; and they pay whatever penalty if they get
caught. Is it that the system is too inflexible, or is it just
an excuse for people who want to commit offences?
Sergeant Charleston: In my own
area, sir, we have great crested newts, a European protected species.
They are in fact very locally common in north-east Wales. I am
aware that virtually every development that takes place in that
area has issues involving great crested newts. I am aware that
for small developers the costs of dealing with European protected
species may render projects unsustainable, and they are then faced
with the situation of either abandoning the project sometimes
or carrying out work to deal with the protected species, rather
than mitigate for them.
Q137 Chairman: Is there a fixed element
of cost or is the cost directly relate to the scale of the work
that is being undertaken or the size of the newt population?
Sergeant Charleston: I think the
costs relate to the size of the newt population rather than anything
else, but it could certainly be considerable. We have recently
had a PFI development on one of our divisional headquarters where
we have had a great crested newt issue, and I am aware that that
has cost our force somewhere in the region of £40,000. That,
I would suggest, is a small issue.
Q138 Chairman: That is moving the
newts and creating new habitat for them somewhere else.
Sergeant Charleston: It is providing
mitigation, trapping them out of the work area and ensuring the
work is carried out efficiently.
Q139 Chairman: I am struggling to
think how you might recommend changes in the recommendations in
order to overcome this problem, because clearly the public wish
to see the newts protected and the developer has an interest in
turning a blind eye if he happens to come across a newt. How can
we devise a system that is flexible—to use your word—so
that it reduces the cost to a point where people are more happy
to comply?
Sergeant Charleston: I do not
have the answer to that, sir. I do know that when I go out to
speak to people considering developments and we get on to talking
about European protected species the question is asked, "what
will I get in court if I commit these offences?" When they
are told the penalties available, as far as monetary penalties
are concerned, they say, "fine, in the scale of the project
we would pay that". We need to address that situation.
Chairman: It sounds as though addressing
the penalty might be the solution rather than addressing the legislation
and process.
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