Driven Grouse Shooting

Olivia Blake Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield Hallam) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship today, Mrs Harris, and I thank all the Members who have spoken in the debate so far. It is fair to say that I will take a slightly different approach on this issue.

I am very proud to have a very active community when it comes to people contacting me, particularly about nature. Six hundred and thirty-five of my constituents signed this petition, which is the highest number of signatories for any constituency in the country. That stems from a deep concern about management practices that affect our community, where we have several grouse moors that are managed.

Grouse shooting has a profound environmental and ecological significance. It is a pastime rooted in privilege and exclusion, which inflicts immense harms on our uplands, our wildlife and our communities. It is hard to imagine that it has any place in a modern, fair and environmentally responsible Britain. I saw on one website that £7,000 a day is how much some estates charge for this excursion.

I have been out and about with gamekeepers in my constituency. They have put to me all these arguments and after many hours of debate, we agreed to disagree. I understand some of the points that colleagues have been making, but I will set out exactly why I think grouse shooting is harmful and requires more regulation.

I am really concerned that grouse shooting is seen as a harmless countryside tradition or a nostalgic relic of rural life. It is a highly commercialised industry in which vast tracts of our uplands are intensively managed not for biodiversity or for the public good, but to produce unnaturally large numbers of one bird species, the red grouse, for the gun. In Scotland, there are vicarious responsibilities and a licensing scheme, and I wonder whether the Minister has a view on those.

To achieve such an unnatural level of grouse, landowners routinely undertake practices that are environmentally destructive and ecologically reckless. They include the widespread burning of heather in moorlands, as we have heard; the draining of some peatlands; and—I am sure no responsible landowner or land manager allows it—the illegal persecution of birds of prey, including many protected species, such as the hen harrier, for which I am the species champion, the golden eagle, the buzzard and the peregrine falcon.

According to the RSPB, the majority of confirmed illegal killings of birds of prey in the past 10 years were linked to land managed for pheasant, partridge or grouse shooting, and RSPB figures show that at least one bird of prey is illegally killed or injured every four days in the UK. Given how precious these species are to our biodiversity, that is a shocking statistic.

The petition was signed by 635 of my constituents. The Moorland Association’s website states that just 700 people are directly employed in grouse moor management. I recognise that, as others have said, there are spin-out commercial opportunities. However, given how vast the contribution is—I think somebody mentioned £52 million earlier—if I were a beater, I might be unionising to take more of that profit home to my family.

The environmental consequences are well documented and grave. Burning heather damages fragile peat bogs, which are among the most vital carbon stores in the country. This degradation means that, instead of being locked away, carbon cannot be stored effectively, which accelerates climate change. The poor condition of our peat was recognised by the last Government. They brought in the peatlands strategy, which I welcomed but felt did not go far enough.

Burning heather heightens flood risks for downstream communities by stripping the land of its natural ability to hold water. I invite anyone to go to a moorland, pick up some sphagnum moss and give it good old squeeze—the water drips out of it, showing how much of a sponge it is. It stores water in our uplands, which is so important. I am very privileged to represent a city with so many hills and rivers, and downstream flooding in our region is very important. We want our peatlands to be restored so that that water is held upland, and this practice is holding that back.

We also want to ensure that our landscapes are not impoverished, stripped of biodiversity and managed for a single commercial interest.

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on being a hen harrier parliamentary champion; I am the puffin parliamentary champion, so we have something in common. She talks about somebody other than landowners managing biodiversity rather in these landscapes. Who would that be, who would pay for it and how much would it cost?

[Olivia Blake]

Those are very good questions, and there are a number of private resources that we could attend to. The Environmental Audit Committee did work on nature capital in the last Parliament, and I think it will this year be publishing a report on it, which am excited to see. For restoration practices, carbon credits are another option. There are also some great landowners who are doing the right thing, whether we are talking about water companies that lease land to grouse moors, which is the case in some places; our national trusts and similar bodies; or the RSPB itself. Smaller-scale land parcels are now even being bought up by organisations such as the Sheffield and Rotherham Wildlife Trust, which are trying to put nature at their heart.

The Government have been open and quick to the game on heather burning, and I welcome their recent consultation on the current ban on deep peat burning, which I get a lot of correspondence about. When the burning is happening, because of the direction of the wind, it comes down the valleys into my constituency. There are moorlands in my constituency, but the majority of people live downwind. It is causing real discomfort for my constituents who have health problems, whether asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or lung cancer. All those people have contacted me about the challenges they face with their breathing.

[Mr Angus MacDonald (Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire) (LD)]

As we speak, there is a massive fire south of Inverness. All around that fire are the gamekeepers in that area. It is they who are controlling that fire, but they do not own that land. The heather has been allowed to grow long, lank and uncontrolled. Does the hon. Lady agree that gamekeepers play an important role in stopping fires on moorlands?

[Olivia Blake]

It is interesting, because what we get depends on who we speak to, which shows there is space for more research. I have spoken to ecologists and specialists who say there is no further risk with the leggy kind of heather than without it, and that the damage done by so-called cold burns is significant, so that is a complicated issue. We have to think about it in the round. We need to communicate to people not to use barbecues or throw away cigarettes when they go on walks—all those simple things. We will face more wildfires as a result of climate change, so we cannot see this issue separately.

It is not only nature that suffers. The economic case made by those who defend grouse shooting simply does not stand up to scrutiny. While a handful of large estates and private shooting syndicates profit, rural communities would benefit far more from land uses that serve not just a privileged few but the wider community, such as nature-based tourism, habitat restoration, sustainable farming and community-led projects. Our uplands belong to us and should work in the public interest.

At the heart of this debate is the question of land, power and inequality. Just 1% of the population owns over half the land in England, and nowhere is that feudal pattern more evident than in our uplands, where vast moorlands remain in the hands of a privileged minority, often propped up by many taxpayer subsidies. That is why I want to see the House back a new community right to buy when it comes to nature. In Sheffield, a large campaign—which includes the great Bob Berzins, an expert in this area—has sprung up to tackle these issues. Giving local people and communities the power to take poorly managed land into collective ownership would be a transformative step. It would restore landscapes for nature, climate and people while creating jobs and opportunities rooted in sustainability and fairness. The Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016 legislated for a community right to buy, setting an example that this House can follow, or at least consider.

I have been involved in community-led rewilding projects to plant sphagnum moss. I see the transformation they have made and, compared with other such projects I have seen, those communities are the real pioneers of getting the work done, seeing what works and learning from it. We could be doing much more to engage with the communities that are getting on with the work of restoring our moorlands.

The public appetite for reform is growing. Conservation charities, environmental scientists, rural communities and tens of thousands of campaigners are calling on this destructive, outdated industry to halt. Scotland has already taken decisive steps to regulate grouse moor management; England cannot afford to fall behind. We have before us a rare opportunity to reimagine our uplands as thriving, biodiverse landscapes; to restore carbon-rich peatlands, reduce flood risks and create rural jobs rooted in sustainability and nature recovery, not ecological harm; and to make these places not private playgrounds but shared natural treasures for the benefit of all.

Driven grouse shooting is a relic of a bygone age. Its environmental damage, ethical failures and economic myths are indefensible in the 21st century. It is time for the House to show leadership, listen to the evidence and empower communities to put our climate, our wildlife and our rural economies first, and consign this practice to history.

--- Later in debate ---

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris. Like the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I draw the House’s attention to the fact that I, like many hundreds of my constituents, am a member of both the Countryside Alliance and the British Association for Shooting and Conservation, and I have been for many years, pre-dating my election in 2019. Likewise, I draw attention to my entries in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, largely from the previous Parliament.

It is a huge pleasure to speak in this debate. Mid Buckinghamshire does not have grouse moors, but shooting is important to us locally. From conversations with many of my constituents who shoot, I know that they travel to shoot grouse in Scotland, North Yorkshire and other moors around the country. Equipment—ammunition, cartridges and so on—will be purchased in our superb gun shops, such as the Oxford Gun Company, which, despite its name, is actually in the village of Oakley in Buckinghamshire, and that directly supports our local economy, too. I want to place on the record my firm support for grouse shooting in principle, not only as a traditional sporting pursuit, but as an activity that delivers measurable environmental, social and economic value to our countryside.

I will address the heart of the matter: the moorlands themselves. Over 75% of the world’s heather moorland is found in Britain. As the hon. Member for Strangford said, this unique landscape is our equivalent of a rainforest: fragile, irreplaceable and internationally important. These are not wild, untouched places; they are shaped and safeguarded by generations of active management, much of which is centred around grouse shooting.

Opponents of grouse shooting often speak of the uplands as if they are best left alone, but the science and the lived experience of those who work this land tell a different story. Controlled heather burning, rotational grazing and predator control are not just practices for the benefit of grouse but the very tools with which we maintain habitat for countless other species. Ground-nesting birds such as curlew, lapwing and golden plover, all of which are red listed for conservation concern, are between three and five times more abundant on managed grouse moors than on unmanaged land.

Moreover, grouse moor management is vital in the fight against wildfires. Controlled cool burns remove the tinder-dry heather that fuels devastating wildfires, which in recent years have destroyed vast swathes of peatland and released hundreds of thousands of tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere. The Government’s own figures show a sharp rise in wildfire incidents in 2025, with 48 reported by spring alone. Managed moors act as fire breaks. Unmanaged ones become kindling.

Some have raised concerns about moor burning and peatland drainage, but again the evidence shows that modern grouse moor managers are leading the charge in peat restoration. In the last decade, they have blocked nearly 3,000km of outdated agricultural drains and restored over 27,000 hectares of bare peat. Those actions actively sequester carbon, improve water quality and reduce downstream flood risk.

Let us not forget the human element. Grouse shooting underpins fragile rural economies. Across England and Scotland, it supports around 3,000 full-time equivalent jobs and injects over £52 million into moorland management annually. Hospitality businesses, equipment suppliers, game dealers and transport firms all benefit, often in communities where few other industries operate outside the tourist season. Socially, the benefits are also clear. Thousands of people participate in grouse shooting each year. It brings communities together, sustains rural traditions and keeps local schools, pubs and shops viable in areas that might otherwise face depopulation and decline.

What of the hen harrier, the emblem of those who seek to see grouse shooting banned? In 2023, a record number of hen harrier chicks fledged, the majority on managed grouse moors. That is not an accident, but the product of targeted conservation partnerships, predator control and habitat stewardship. BASC and others are funding brood management, habitat creation and even southern reintroduction efforts. Gamekeepers are not the enemy of the hen harrier; they are its strongest ally in the uplands.

Let me be clear: wildlife crime, including raptor persecution, is abhorrent and must be stamped out. We enjoy the red kites above Buckinghamshire, and I have yet to meet anyone who would even think of trying to harm one of those beautiful birds. Anyone who seeks to do so should be brought to justice.

[Olivia Blake]

I just feel that the hon. Gentleman is putting his head in the sand. Yes, there are more fledglings, but does he know what happened to them?

[Greg Smith]

The evidence is very clear that populations are up. I think all those who oppose grouse shooting, and who wish to see this petition as the gold standard, really should look at the evidence of the overall numbers in this country, which are up.

To return to the point about raptor persecution, this crime is not systemic; it is the work of a lawbreaking minority, and shooting organisations have rightly adopted a zero-tolerance approach. Anyone convicted should face the full force of the law.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for introducing this important debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee, and I thank the more than 104,000 signatories to the petition.

Let me be absolutely clear with the many petitioners and other interested parties watching this debate: it is not my view that grouse shooting should be banned. I hope that over the course of my remarks it will become clear why that is my view and, indeed, the view of the Conservative party.

We must begin by recognising that grouse moorland is not a natural habitat. Just as the charm of the British countryside is managed by farmers, grouse moorland is managed by gamekeepers, farmers, estates and shooting syndicates that use it. If grouse shooting were banned, the moorland would not be as it is today. I worked as a rural practice surveyor before entering this place, and I advised and was involved in many moorland restoration projects—as well as spending many a Saturday when I was a young lad beating on grouse moors to earn a small wage—so I know the economic, social, environmental and ecological importance of grouse shooting to our uplands.

Banning grouse shooting would have significant ramifications. Across the UK, 1.8 million hectares of moorland are specifically used for grouse shooting, and they account for about 75% of the world’s supply of this remarkable habitat. Moorland is, in effect, unique to these islands, and we should be proud and protective of it. Red grouse, the species most commonly used in shooting, is also unique to these islands.

It is worth pausing to note that grouse shooting does not involve the specific rearing and release of birds. Grouse shoots use wild populations of birds that are carefully managed to create the numbers needed to prevent endangerment. The fact that grouse management straddles the line between true animal husbandry and wild hunting is precisely why the industry has such ecological and environmental benefits. The activity drives economic incentives to invest in the upkeep of grouse populations, manage their habitat for other species and provide significant environmental benefits.

Just as the careful management of heather benefits grouse, so it benefits other species, such as lapwing, curlew, golden plover and the rare merlin, as many hon. and right hon. Members have pointed out. Such protected species rely on good, healthy heather for food and shelter, and without proper management, their numbers would decline.

Much of our moorland is also peatland, and grouse moor management schemes have restored approximately 27,000 hectares of bare peat in the past 20 years. Colleagues may know that I have been a big champion of peatland to store and sequester carbon, so efforts to restore it are very welcome. Peat in the UK stores 26 times as much carbon as UK forests, yet it regenerates naturally by only 1 mm a year in depth, making its protection and proper management vital to reducing carbon emissions. Through its management of grouse moors, grouse shooting can only contribute towards the success of that, including its economic benefits.

It is right that I pause here to discuss the burning of heather, which was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) and other Members. The concerns of proponents of a ban on burning may be understandable, but they fail to consider the full picture and, dare I say it, are sometimes completely ill-informed. Their surface-level analysis ignores the fact that moorland is a managed landscape and must continue to be managed if we want it to remain in the enhanced habitat state that we see it in today.

[Olivia Blake]

Can the hon. Member remind me which Government brought in a partial ban on peatland burning?

[Robbie Moore]

Clearly, the reason why our moorlands are in the state they are in today is the collective management that is taking place, whether by mechanical means or through the moorland management burning plans that exist. If we were to end the burning of heather altogether, we would allow the woody stock to generate that has led to the very fires that were rightly referred to by the hon. Member for Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire (Mr MacDonald). Right now, gamekeepers are the people on the ground trying to cope with those fires and help our fire services out.

No burning would mean a build-up of vegetation and woody stock, which is itself a negative influence on the sustainability of heather for bird species of all kinds, but what is perhaps worse is that eventually, in the natural cycle, such overgrown heather is much more prone to catching fire. When it does, it will lead to huge and far more damaging wildfires, which are costly to communities and hugely damaging to the environment.

I have seen this for myself in my West Yorkshire constituency on Ilkley moor—another moor that is not managed, exactly the same as Fylingdales moor in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton. A series of smaller and cooler man-made fires, agreed and signed off via an approved moorland management burning plan, is vital for enhancing the ecological status of moorland, helps to improve the complex and desirable mosaic of the moorland, and significantly reduces the risk of dangerous unplanned fires. Once we understand that burning is the management of a natural process, and not destruction for destruction’s sake, it is far harder to justify banning it.