Conference focuses on Highland wildlife crime
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
POLICE, conservation bodies and landowners have been meeting in Inverness today (Thursday) to discuss wildlife crime.
The aim of the conference at Police HQ was to improve partnership working to tackle wildlife crime.
The issue has been a hot topic in the Highlands following the poisoning of 22 raptors - 16 red kites and six buzzards - on the Black Isle last year.
There was public outrage and a reward fund of nearly £30,000 was raised for information leading to the identity of the culprit.
However nobody has ever been brought to book.
Agencies attending the conference included Scottish Land and Estates, RSPB, Scottish SPCA, Scottish Wildlife Trust, Scottish Raptor Study Group, Association of District Salmon Fisheries Boards, Forestry Commission for Scotland, Scottish Natural Heritage, Highland Council, the Cairngorms National Park and Scottish Gamekeepers’ Association.
Delegates heard about many different topics, including freshwater pearl mussel crime and new advances in DNA profiling now helping to assist police investigations.
North Division Wildlife Crime Co-ordinator Chief Inspector Colin Gough said: "It’s been excellent to have so many different partner agencies attending today providing input on how we can work together to tackle wildlife crime.
"Already we have been able to evidence how recent advances in technology help us link the suspect with the crime - in doing so we send out a very strong message that wildlife crime is not tolerated by Police Scotland and the many agencies involved in protecting our wildlife."
Keith Duncan, Operations Officer for Scottish National Heritage added: "This level of co-ordinated partnership working at both a national and a regional level is key to successful outcomes and in raising awareness to local communities and members of the public.
"Wildlife crime can often go unreported so ensuring members of the public are confident in reporting such incidents is an important step going forward."
In December, the Scottish Government’s rural affairs, climate change and environment committee called for wildlife crime detection and prosecution to be improved following an inquiry into the issue.
MSPs took evidence from senior police officers and the Crown Office at Holyrood as part of the inquiry.
But in their findings, they said criminal proceedings only appeared to be taken in around a fifth of wildlife crimes reported to police, and of those over 20 per cent were then marked "no action" by the Crown Prosecution Service.
That had to improve, said MSPs.
