Cover Up?

I was sorting through some paperwork last night when I came across a file marked "MAFF" (Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries & Food -the body that became DEFRA (Dept Environment Farming and Rural Affairs).

I had forgotten an exchange of letters with them in the mid 1990s.  They had stated clearly that there had never been any reports of wild living wolverine (Gulo gulo) in the UK. I challenged them on this and gave the names of RSPCA Inspectors (when that job meant something), dates, times and locations that they had sighted and reported such animals.  I gave similar for naturalists who had seen wolverine and even incidents where police were called out over a "rather angry animal" which they identified via my fact sheets as wolverine.

The MAFF person apologised and corrected the statement as to "no wolverine reported to MAFF as causing live stock problems". So they were not saying that there were no such animals in the UK -just not reported to them (a lie in fact).

In another exchange I cited incidents, dates, times, locations and offered contact details for people of sound reputation who had sighted large exotic cats (non-native is only really applies to recent escapees). I suggested that rather than repeatedly get embroiled in press chat that they tried to avoid, it might be an idea to get anyone reporting sightings to contact me.  After all, I had been doing this for 20 years by then and police forces passed on reports and I was a member of Partners Against Wildlife Crime (PAWS).

There were no large cats in the UK they told me. They had guidelines on how to deal with such cats IF they threatened livestock so long as it breached no poisons or other legislation.  Hang on...there were NO CATS out there but they had issued guidelines to deal with these non existent cats?

Oh they were doing more than just advising.  Active trapping and killing of cats -I had the report from a police wildlife officer and got a signed affidavit from the farmer involved who was shocked and outraged as he thought the cat was being knocked out to go to a zoo. 

DEFRA's chief veterinary officer dealing with big cats amongst other things had me blacklisted from contacting her office and DEFRA blocked me from PAWS as a consultant despite my being backed by two chief constables.

Yes, these cats ARE out there. MAFF and now DEFRA know it and, I really really hate to write this: they have been covering up these matters for a long time and I and police officers, farmers groups and others know it.



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