Who Owns England?

The ecological devastation wrought by grouse moors doesn’t stop there. Gamekeepers manage them in such a way as to create a habitat ideally suited to grouse. This has the beneficial side-effect of bolstering conditions for other ground nesting birds, too. But it means curtains for the species that would normally prey upon them. There should be 300 pairs of hen harriers in the English uplands; instead, thanks to illegal persecution by the gamekeepers of grouse moors, there are just four pairs left. Foxes, stoats, weasels and other natural predators of grouse are shot or caught in traps. Even beautiful mountain hares are exterminated, because the ticks they carry can spread disease to grouse.

All this land is owned and managed for the benefit of a vanishingly small number of people. There are only around 150 grouse estates in England. Even the Spectator calls grouse shooting ‘screamingly elitist’. Through a laborious research process, I’ve been able to identify the owners of some 500,000 acres of English grouse moors, and around half, by my reckoning, remain in the hands of the aristocracy and landed gentry. These include Baron Raby