Examination of Witnesses (Questions 235
- 239)
THURSDAY 8 JULY 2004
MR MARTIN
BRASHER, MR
MARTIN CAPSTICK
AND MR
NICK P WILLIAMS
Q235 Chairman: Good morning and welcome
to this gentle stroll through wildlife crime. We are very grateful
to you for coming and also for your written memorandum, which
we have received with interest. In that, one of the things you
highlight is the absence of a central comprehensive record of
wildlife offences. The reason for that is that notification is
not required by the Home Office. To what extent is that a problem?
Mr Brasher: I suppose the short
answer is that it would be better if there were one, and that
is why this is one of the priority activities for the Partnership
for Action Against Wildlife Crime in its next programme of work
over the next three years. It is not easy because it is difficult
to have a clear, agreed definition of wildlife crime setting out
exactly what you are talking about. It is also true to say that
a fair bit of information is collected already. Certainly on my
side, which is the Global Wildlife Division within Defra, where
we are dealing principally with CITES offences, import and export,
a great deal of information is collected by Customs, and they
provide some of that for you in their memorandum. Information
exists there, and there are other contexts in which information
is collected, for example under the auspices of PAW. Attempts
have been made to try to gather information in particular areas.
There has been an approach within Wales, and this is partly because
Richard Brunstrom co-chairs the partnership with me and is very
keen on this. It is not that there is no information; there is
a lot of information, but it is quite right that there is not
a single—
Q236 Chairman: It is the absence
of a central reference point that is the issue there.
Mr Brasher: Exactly.
Q237 Chairman: Have you made efforts
to try and persuade the Home Office to grasp this?
Mr Brasher: The PAW initiative
was reviewed last in 2003. The Home Office is part of the PAW
initiative and they attend meetings. A complete review document
was produced. It looked at things like the question of definition
and the recording, and a great many other things. An enforcement
plan was agreed to look in the next three years, 2004-07, at the
practicalities of doing this and achieving it. Through PAW we
are trying to work towards that.
Q238 Chairman: Your memorandum refers
to a good dialogue and co-operation with many departments, such
as DTI, Foreign Office and DfID; but it does not mention the Home
Office. Am I right in suspecting a slight stand-off between yourselves
and the Home Office on this?
Mr Capstick: I am responsible
for the European Wildlife Division, which, curiously, has responsibility
for biodiversity in England but also co-ordinates for the UK within
Europe. We do generally have a pretty good dialogue with the Home
Office on lots of the offences for which we are responsible, and
we deal jointly with campaigns that we face from, for example
badger groups that are concerned about the lack of notifiable
offences. I do not think wildlife crime is out of step with other
crimes, in the sense that for them to be notifiable, on the whole
I understand that these are offences that are potentially triable
either way, either by a magistrate or in a crown court, and some
wildlife offences are and some are not. It is therefore an issue
that we keep under review with the Home Office, and we do discuss
with them when they are looking at updating what they are proposing;
but at the moment, as the Home Office Official indicated when
he appeared before you on a separate discussion on environmental
crime more broadly—
Q239 Chairman: Not exactly a priority.
Mr Capstick: Exactly. I do not
detect that there is urgent movement on this, though that does
not mean that we do not discuss it with them.
| 
