A ban on lead ammunition has been ruled out by Liz Truss, Secretary of State for the Environment. Liz Truss has rejected the Lead Ammunition Group (LAG) process’ recommendations and it has been confirmed that there will be no further restrictions on the use of lead ammunition.

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BAN ON LEAD AMMUNITION RULED OUT

Liz Truss has rejected the recommendations of the LAG process. It has been confirmed that a ban on lead ammunition has been ruled out by the government and there will be no further restrictions on the use of lead ammunition.

In a letter to LAG chairman, John Swift, Liz Truss said: “the report did not show that the impacts of lead ammunition were significant enough to justify changing current policy; we therefore do not accept your recommendation to ban the use of lead ammunition”.

Her letter confirmed that the Food Standards Agency will not be changing its advice on the consumption of game shot with lead ammunition. Liz Truss also noted that “the report does not provide evidence of causation linking possible impacts of lead ammunition with sizes of bird populations”.

It has been confirmed that the LAG process has now ended.

Leading countryside groups have welcomed the news.

BASC chairman Peter Glenser said: “The government has engaged in a lengthy, evidence-based analysis of the use of lead ammunition and has found there is no reason to change the law.

“Risks are there to be managed and it is quite clear from current evidence that by following FSA advice and trimming meat of shot-affected areas, the risk can be eliminated.

“The UK has also acted to protect vulnerable species by legislating on the use of lead shot for wildfowl and over wetlands.

“Unfortunately, the lead ammunition debate has been hijacked by campaigners who are looking to damage shooting as a whole. This puts them back in their box.”

Countryside Alliance Chief Executive, Tim Bonner, said: “The LAG process has been mind-numbingly slow and increasingly controversial. So controversial in fact that half of the group resigned, unable to work with its Chairman John Swift, before LAG finally submitted its final report to Defra last year. Those resignations included that of our then Executive Chairman Barney White-Spunner who said at the time that he left because of abuses of process and evidence that render the group’s work so flawed it can never reach any scientific conclusions.

“We are profoundly grateful that the Alliance’s position has been entirely vindicated by the Secretary of State and that she has rejected any further restrictions on the use of lead ammunition, let alone the total ban on lead ammunition that John Swift proposed in his report.

“A ban on the use of lead ammunition would have a significant impact on the huge contribution shooting makes to conservation, to local communities and to the rural economy. From the start of this process the Countryside Alliance was, therefore, very clear that any further restrictions could only ever be justified on the basis of real, relevant scientific evidence. The painstaking work of successive Alliance representatives on LAG has revealed that evidence just does not exist.”

Jonathan Young, Editor of The Field, said: “This is the best news for shooting in decades.

“For years we have been living under the threat of a ban on lead shot, which would have had dire consequences for British gameshooting and the wildlife it supports. Now we have a government that has had the resolve to reject the claims made by the rump of the Lead Ammunition Group and its chairman John Swift, and we can all move forward.”

The full letter from Liz Truss to John Swift can be read here.