Driven Grouse Shooting

Sam Rushworth Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Sam Rushworth (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

I have supported animal welfare since I was a teenager, when I first visited the Redwings horse sanctuary in Norfolk, where I learned about battery farming. At college, I set up an animal welfare group, and I used to work for an animal welfare charity. I care about the welfare of all animals and birds, including grouse.

I have no interest in shooting grouse. I believe—although some may challenge me on this—that I represent England’s largest grouse moors, in Teesdale and Weardale. I have never shot an animal in my life. I have shot a gun—during a short period in Canada, I greatly enjoyed target shooting—but I am not interested in grouse shooting. That does not mean we should ban it.

I am here as a Labour MP to represent my constituents. My first priority will always be the jobs and livelihoods of the people I represent. At a conservative estimate, 500 jobs in the Bishop Auckland constituency—in Teesdale and Weardale—rely on revenues from grouse shooting, including the gamekeepers, those who run gun shops, provide hospitality during shoots, maintain dry stone walls, look after the lodges and train dogs, and the young people for whom being a beater is a great way to earn a seasonal wage. I am here to speak for them. As the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), noted earlier, I really find it insulting when these people’s wages are talked about as “economically insignificant”. Others may consider it economically insignificant in the context of the national economy, but if someone is doing a job that their dad did before them and their grandfather did before him, if they grew up on that land and that is the job they want to do, their livelihood is not economically insignificant; it is what puts food on their table.

To talk about conservation, I recently had the pleasure of attending an event called Let’s Learn Moor with primary school children from my constituency. It was a wonderful day out, and I really enjoyed it. The children learned about the conservation of peat bogs, as well as all the various fantastic birds and wildlife that we have. Anyone can come to Teesdale and Weardale and see it for themselves; they will find no other place in the country where they can stand and within an hour observe curlews, lapwings and oystercatchers flying past. Those birds are there because they are preserved by predator control.

While I do not shoot grouse and never would, I have got up with friends at 4 am and gone out to the most remarkable and spectacular lek to see the black grouse that come together to the same spot every year to find their mate. We should be doing more to encourage eco-tourism in my part of the world, so that more people can enjoy the wonderful wildlife that we have because we live in a managed landscape.

At Let’s Learn Moor, the children met the Bishop Auckland fire brigade, who had come up to the top of the moor to demonstrate how they put out a moorland fire. They had a pump down in the river, and the children had a wonderful time spraying a firehose, which nearly hit us. I asked the firefighters about the method for managing and putting out moorland fires, and they said, “Well, the first thing we do is call the gamekeepers. They’re the experts at managing the fires, and they are normally first on the scene.” A local gamekeeper talked to me about his responsibility to manage not only predators but the land around him. He talked about his experiences moving on campers, including one occasion when he discovered people who had created a circle of stones and lit a fire; he moved them on to camp in a local pub’s garden.

To echo the point made by the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton about regulation, the gamekeepers also talked about how carefully they must tread when they come across foolish tourists who did not learn the countryside code in school. They told me, “If there is one allegation against us that we have been in any way aggressive, they will whip our guns away straightaway, because it is so tightly regulated.” They did not deny that there is occasional bad practice, and they were as disgusted as me by the criminality that sometimes occurs on the moorland, but the point is that it is criminality; we already have laws against such practices. Perhaps we need to look at how we enforce those laws; we do not necessarily need to create a whole new set.

Of course there are questions about how we manage the environment, and how we stop criminality and animal cruelty, but simply banning a sport that people have engaged in for generations will not solve those problems. It is vital that we keep the money flowing into our community. If we lost that revenue, we would lose jobs, and we would even lose primary schools, which would have to close. We are already seeing far too many families leaving the tops of the dales because of the lack of work. We would also lose the wildlife; it is not there by chance. With respect to those who signed the petition, and with a heartfelt understanding of their motives, I have to oppose it today.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs (Daniel Zeichner)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mrs Harris. I start by thanking the Petitions Committee and the more than 100,000 people who signed the petition for giving us the opportunity to discuss this important subject today. I also acknowledge the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), who opened the debate. I thought he was going to have a shot at making the case for the petition, but he fessed up very early. It was good to see him at the Royal Highland Show the other day.

It is clear from the petition and the discussion today that Parliament and the wider country care dearly about the issue of driven grouse shooting and managing our uplands in a sustainable way that protects wildlife, the environment and, very importantly, the people who live there.

I can confirm at the outset to the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) that, although the Government have no plans to ban grouse shooting, I appreciate it is a topic that understandably evokes strong opinions on both sides of the debate, and we keep options under close review.

I also listened closely to the powerful economic arguments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Sam Rushworth) and the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak). I fully appreciate the economic benefits that come from that part of the rural economy, but valid concerns have been raised on the issue of wildlife, most notably the birds of prey that live in those areas and that, sadly, have been all too frequently persecuted. It is disturbing to hear the statistics from the RSPB’s recent publication, “Hen Harriers in the firing line”.

I heard the statistics cited by the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk, but I also note the statistics and comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Hallam (Olivia Blake). There were 102 confirmed hen harrier persecution incidents in the last five years, with 89% taking place in northern England. In 2023 alone, 34 hen harriers were confirmed to have been killed or disappeared under suspicious circumstances. As the RSPB argues, it is a concern that only two people have been prosecuted for offences relating to the persecution of a hen harrier, and those incidents took place in Scotland.

While birds of prey are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, it is vital that the law is respected by those involved in the grouse shooting industry. I absolutely hear the comments made by Conservative Members, and we all agree that there is no place for raptor persecution.

[Sam Rushworth]

I thank the Minister for his balanced approach to this subject and for protecting the livelihoods of my constituents. I agree with him that we need to look after animal welfare. I do not think the economic arguments we have been making today apply to trail hunting. Will he confirm today that it is still the will of this Government to set out a timetable for banning trail hunting?

[Daniel Zeichner]

That is a manifesto commitment, and this Government keep their commitments.

Bird of prey crime is a national wildlife crime priority, and the Government take wildlife crime extremely seriously. There are strong penalties in place for offences committed against birds of prey and other wildlife, and anyone found guilty of such offences should feel the full force of the law. Penalties can include an unlimited fine and/or a six-month custodial sentence.

My Department is providing £424,000 in 2025-26 to the National Wildlife Crime Unit, which does valuable work to prevent and detect wildlife crime by obtaining and disseminating intelligence, undertaking analysis and directly assisting law enforcers. In 2024, the National Wildlife Crime Unit launched the hen harrier taskforce, which is using technology such as drones and strategic partnerships to detect, deter and disrupt offenders and is targeting hotspot areas and suspected hen harrier persecution. Early signs suggest that it is having a positive impact. I congratulate the National Wildlife Crime Unit and its partners on their valuable work in tackling the persecution of those iconic birds of prey.

Grouse shooting takes place in upland areas, which are of huge national and international importance, as we have heard, and when healthy, they provide numerous environmental benefits. Blanket bog provides a rich habitat for many species, sequesters carbon, filters our drinking water and helps with flood control. That is why, over the spending review period, we will be investing £85 million in our peatlands, as well as seeing increased funding through landscape recovery and countryside stewardship.

However, 80% of England’s peatlands are degraded, as we heard so powerfully from my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Hallam. I know there are different views, but many argue that rotational burning is a contributory factor in the degradation of upland areas. It is commonplace in moorlands that are managed for grouse, where vegetation is burned to improve conditions for raising grouse.

Continual burning damages peatlands, as it affects their hydrology by drying them out. Those degraded peatlands then emit the carbon they once stored. That is why DEFRA recently held a public consultation on proposals to extend the Heather and Grass etc. Burning (England) Regulations 2021, to which the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley and others have referred. The proposed amendments would increase the area of moorland protected from the negative impacts of burning and extend the existing licensing scheme to allow burning to be used in certain limited circumstances.

The ritualistic denunciation of Natural England is disappointing, as it is made up of civil servants who are doing their best to provide sound advice to Government. As the Government’s adviser on the natural environment in England, Natural England provides statutory advice to Ministers, but the final decision on whether to grant a licence under the regulations lies with the Secretary of State.