Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to protect swans from harm caused by catapults in Newbury constituency.

The Government takes crimes against wildlife seriously, including those involving the use of catapults to cause harm to swans, in Newbury or anywhere else in the country.

Although catapults are not listed as prohibited weapons in the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, within this legislation there are a range of offences around deliberate attempts to kill, injure or inflict harm on wild birds. The Government therefore believes sufficient legislation is already in place to protect them from targeted use of catapults.

Defra is also a principal funder of the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU) which helps prevent and detect wildlife crime by obtaining and disseminating intelligence, undertaking analysis which highlights local or national threats and directly assisting law enforcers in their investigations.

However, Defra recognises the misuse of catapults is causing great concern to some local communities and are working with the Home Office to find solutions to this problem with the aim of increasing protection to our wildlife from crimes involving these weapons.