LETTERS Feathering nests
Sir: Congratulations are due to Sally Richardson for her exposé of the activities of RSPB investigators (`Strictly for the birds', 25 May).
I too have heard of many similar inst- ances of harassment of innocent people at the hands of the RSPB.
Big business though it may be, the RSPB is not an official government agency and is nothing more than a collection of private individuals who have no more legal rights than the ordinary citizen of this country. Why should they, therefore, be granted search-warrants just for the asking when there is an official government body (the Nature Conservancy Council) which could perform the task of investigating alleged breaches of the Wildlife and Countryside Act?
It is high time the law clamped down on the activities of the RSPB's 'private army' and imposed statutory penalties in cases of raids on innocent people. After all, what other group of private individuals has the power to enter and search your home without any legal comeback?
Time and again we have heard this highly media-conscious organisation moan on television, radio and in the press about the money to be made by an assortment of people ranging from falconers and egg- collectors to cage-bird dealers and taxider- mists through trade in birds. As one peruses the glossy gift catalogues advertis- ing limited edition prints, table mats and a vast array of assorted trinkets (all proudly sporting the RSPB emblem), one might be forgiven for thinking that falconers and cage-bird dealers are not the only ones making a fast buck out of our feathered friends!
Mark A. Hope
3 Grahamston Avenue, Glengarnock, Ayshire
Previous page
