HB meeting 23rd January 2025
Summarised minutes from meeting held on Zoom on 23rd January 2025.
Archived and detailed minutes are available through your affiliated club representative.
Present
Gary Biddiss (Vice Chair)
Cameron Balfour (Scottish Hawk Board)
Sharon Creffield (South East Raptor Association)
Jim Collins (SUN)
Prof Mark Fielder (Co-opted)
Helen Fox (Specialist Member)
Dr Nick Fox (Co-opted)
Peter Gill (Co-opted)
Nick Havemann-Mart (Welsh Hawking Club)
Charlie Heap (Co-opted)
Ben Kniveton (Observer)
Dr Gordon Mellor (Specialist Member)
Charlotte Souto Hill (Co-opted)
Mark Upton (Specialist Member)
Rachelle Upton (Co-ordinator/Treasurer)
Dean White (South East Falconry Group)
Apologies
Paul Manning (Wessex Falconry & Hampshire Hawking Club)
Don Ryan (Irish Hawking Club)
Martyn Standley (Specialist Member)
Meeting discussion points
2. Minutes of last meeting/Matters arising
3. Chair’s Report
As discussed at our last meeting the HB UNESCO Group has worked on the draft of the Falconry National Submission. It had been decided that although the Department for Culture, Media and Sport appeared to be no further forward in being ready to accept applications that we should arrange a meeting with them and propose to send in our application to see what happened. Dr Nick Fox and I had a meeting with Department for Culture, Media and Sport on 22 November where we discussed their progress with the UNESCO organisation. At that time, they were no further forward with being ready to start accepting applications for National Subscriptions. They are hoping to be ready by summer this year. We discussed applications and our own application, and it seems they are unprepared for applications at the present time. I have had no response since.
I attended the CITES legislative reform stakeholder animal focus session at Bristol on 28 October along with Jim Collins in person and Dr Nick Fox online. Most animal sustainable user groups had representatives attending the meeting. The welfare groups only had representatives attending online. The meeting was interesting and the main things that came out of it, concerning us, is that they are looking at new national registration for raptors to improve traceability. They also hinted at changes in CITES rules which might be imposed on UK by the CITES secretariat. We have since been made aware of these changes and I also have attended online meetings about this. It was made clear at the October Meeting that these were early discussions of new legislation and there would be a consultation period coming in 2025.
I attended the APHA Breeders Meeting on 9 December. This was a very useful meeting organised for Hawk Breeders. There are new CITES rules coming in which will mainly affect breeders of gyrs of peregrines. All breeders wanting to export gyrs and peregrines will have to register with APHA which will involve quite a lot of new record keeping. Most of those present in the meeting understood that these new measures are being imposed on the UK by the CITES Secretariat. There seems to be some negative response to this online, which appears to me to be a misunderstanding of why this new legislation is coming in, and that it is not a UK decision.
I have had some communication with a falconer who was having difficulty with paperwork for falcons he had helped out by taking on, following the welfare case in the midlands, where a breeding project had failed, and birds had to be taken into care. After discussions with APHA on his behalf it appears that he and others have been caught up in a situation where the main person rescuing the birds and the police were told that they should not pass on any of the birds without consulting APHA and getting the relevant paperwork where possible. This of course was a very difficult situation but those involved have put falconers who were only trying to do the right thing by giving homes to welfare cases in an extremely difficult situation. I asked APHA to take part in our meeting to discuss this and the new CITES Legislation.
I have followed up the letter from the Female Falconers Club which we discussed at the last meeting. Dr Nick Fox, Gary Biddiss and I are attending the FFC meeting in February to do a presentation and answer questions on behalf of HB.
Avian Influenza has returned and there seem to be a few more cases than last year, although not on the scale of the previous years. Most cases have been in the East and North East and there have been housing measures introduced. We have posted the latest rules and advice on the new HB website and Facebook and have been attending monthly Avian Influenza and Biosecurity Stakeholder Meetings. Falconers need to keep an eye on restrictions, remain vigilant and maintain good biosecurity.
Positive Lists have come back to the agenda in Europe and The European Commission has commissioned a study on the “need, added value, and feasibility of introducing a ‘positive list of pets’ across the EU” and have opened a survey to facilitate stakeholder input for this. HB needs to take part in the survey and encourage clubs and falconers to do so. You can find the survey here: https://survey.alchemer.eu/s3/90758880/Positive-list-of-pets
4. Treasurers Report
5. UNESCO Application
Covered in Chair’s Report
6. CITES Legislative Reform
A long discussion was held, with several grievances being brought up by Peter Gill, concerning lack of answers from earlier Breeders Meetings with APHA. The APHA Cites Registration spokesperson in the meeting stated that she had answered several of the questions but could sometimes only do so as and when she had got the relevant answers to those questions. She had also sent HB a CITES Registered Breeders Application - Frequently asked Q & A Fact Sheet which we can post in a few days once she has had time to distribute to breeders. One of the questions answered was about whether CITES registered breeders would only be able to breeding stock coming from other CITES registered breeders which was thought to be the case. This was answered by “Any new bird intended to form part of the breeding stock covered by their registration do not have to come from other CITES registered breeders however all trade and commercial acquisitions must be covered by a valid A10 and a legal acquisition finding.”
There were other questions relating to the number of semen donors that can be registered as possible fathers of chicks. It was thought this is going to be limited to 5 but they were told that it could be any number but that more than 5 on the registration application would have to be passed on to compliance who would be more likely to follow up with questions.
This took up a great deal of the meeting although it was only really relevant to a small number of hawk breeders. Several of the board thanked APHA for contributing to the debate and stated that we understood that the reason for breeders who want to export CITES Annex A are having registration imposed on them because of the UK having to accept rules being imposed by the CITES Secretariat.
7. Rescued Birds and APHA
Covered in Chair’s Report.
8. Avian Influenza
Covered in Chair’s Report
9. SUN Update
Jim Collins also talked about the CITES legislative reform stakeholder animal focus session at Bristol and expect the consultation period to be out in the first months of this year. DEFRA have confirmed that they will be seeking to bring the UK (as is also the case for the EU) back into CITES compliance regarding a mandatory requirement to register all facilities that are breeding Annex A species for commercial purposes that involve international trade. The current thinking being that this will be mandated by the end of 2026 at the latest. As things stand, those only selling domestically will not be included in the registration requirements, but this could change (again depending, to some extent, on our further relationship with the EU).
Positive Lists continue to be seen as the panacea to everything by our opponents and lobbying and our counter-lobbying is occurring every week both within the UK and the devolved administrations and through the EU (also internationally).
SUN and affiliates met with the governmental authorities in regard to the proposed revision of the UK CITES Regulations, post-Brexit.
10. Scottish Update / Mountain Hare
Cameron Balfour reported that there has been no movement on the Mountain Hare issue in Scotland since our last meeting.
He was asked about the falconry within the Wildlife Management and Muirburn Act for Grouse Shooting Estates. He said this was a good news story for Falconry in Scotland because there was an exemption for falconry within the act. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2024/4/section/9
11. IAF Update
Mark Upton explained that he had taken over the Presidency of the IAF from HE Majed al Mansouri on the 1 January and had been working hard on re-establishing the funding for the IAF from the Emirates Falconry Club. He hadn’t been able to get the level of funding that the IAF had previously enjoyed but had managed to sign an agreement with EFC for funding of the IAF Office and staff for the next year at a reduced level. This means that the IAF can continue to run but won’t be able to send delegates to international meetings in the way it has in the past.
Mark has also initiated a new board and is working on revising the working groups within the organisation.
12 CA Update
13 Extra Items asked for by Charlie Heap
The role of the Hawk Board - is it to represent everyone who has a raptor in their garden or to have more of a leadership role?
Funding the HB - getting fund raising going and looking at individual/trade membership.
Look at adding transparency to operating costs and publishing expenditure details.
Expanding the range of HB guidance documents and updating existing ones if required
PR - look at getting PR better going forward
Related to PR - look at getting a list of previous HB achievements collated and published on the website
Look at ways of resolving the commercial/private conflict. Maybe separating the 2
interests into different committees?
A long discussion took place on these items although much of it is covered by the new HB presentation being developed by Gary Biddiss and Martyn Standley which HB are hoping to use at events to be organised during the coming year to disseminate what the HB are about.
Most of the ideas were thought to be constructive and worth following up.
14. A.O.B
Nothing brought up
Next Meeting: TBC January 2025