Campaigners fear new housing, holiday homes and felling are putting pressure on some of the rodent’s last habitats across the country
Brits have been urged by campaigners to save our red squirrels. They are warning that the critters have weaker legal protection for their breeding sites than beavers and bats.
And activists fear new housing, holiday homes and felling are putting pressure on some of the rodent’s last habitats across the country.
They want a legal loophole closed where a person accused of killing a red squirrel or destroying its home can rely on a defence if they show it was the result of a lawful operation and couldn’t have been avoided. Marie Carter-Robb, founder of Save Our Reds, said: “Today it is easier to destroy a red squirrel’s home than a bat’s.
Beavers, driven to extinction here around 400 years ago and since returned, now have stronger protection for their breeding sites than a native animal that has lived in Britain for ten thousand years.
“That cannot be right. From Cumbria to Anglesey we keep seeing the same pattern: red squirrels are known to be there, and their habitat still faces development and felling pressures.
“Ministers already hold powers to strengthen protection through secondary legislation, and the beaver precedent shows that species protection can be extended.”
The same legal defence was removed for bats, dormice, otters and great crested newts back in 2007. It comes after Natural England chiefs warned red squirrels could vanish from mainland England within 25 years.
Dr Peter Lurz, honorary fellow at the University of Edinburgh and a red squirrel expert, said: “The current system of regulation and the legal framework allow timber extraction to be prioritised over red squirrel conservation, with impacts on survival that are not yet well understood.
“We need better protection and much greater consideration of our endangered red squirrels in decisions affecting their habitat. Consideration of red squirrel habitat within planning and forestry decisions should be mandatory.”