Scotland gains seal killing legislation

While the mainstream media concentrates on handing out beatings to our various Governments over headline articles (stuff like recession and inflation), it’s nice to get a reminder that some departments are still ‘getting on with the knitting’, and raising legislation on matters that still… er… matter.

While I am not a ‘seal campaigner’ or suchlike, and wonder if there would be so many people up in arms about the seal killings if they look more like man-eating alien spiders, I still take on board the apparent cruelty and barbarism that seems to abound in those that have previously believed they has some sort of right to go around killing seals for a variety of reason.

Scotland now has legislation in place as part of the Marine (Scotland) Act, which will issue licences which specify the maximum numbers of grey or common seal which each licensee may shoot. Offender face a penalty of up to six months in jail or a heavy fine. 66 licence applications are reported to be under consideration.

Conservation areas in Moray Firth, Shetland, Orkney, Firth of Tay and the Western Isles are designed to protect local populations of common seals.

Previously, cases could be brought to court and offenders charged with cruelty to animals, as in the case of a fisherman who clubbed 21 grey seal pups to death on the remote Shetland island of East Linga, and was jailed for 80 days for ‘mutilating, beating and crushing’ the animals.