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It would have been far better – and much closer to the truth – to say that English Nature were tasked with coming up with a number of sites in a limited time, and that so far as the coastal zone is concerned, they simply did not have the scientific study data to be fully objective, or the resources or time to do anything about it. Instead they tried to cover up their lack of data with a veneer of pseudo science.
For example, having made their selection of sites as Special Areas of Conservation, the country conservation agencies (English Nature, Countryside Council for Wales, and Scottish Natural Heritage) working together as the Join Nature Conservation Council (JNCC) produced a weighty report which showed that there were important representations at each site of the features identified in the annexes of the Habitats Directive. No attempt was made to demonstrate that these were the best sites (which would have required some form of ranking and comparison with the national stock of each feature). The Habitats Directive requires a selection of sites, not all sites to be designated. This implies a measure of choice. If choice is possible then various factors, perhaps even social and economic factors, could be taken into account in exercising that choice. But JNCC had decided before the report was written which sites were the “best”, and had decided that for their purpose everything else was “unimportant” or “irrelevant”. In short, the report is lengthy self justification.
This report was the cover up of the original cock up.
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