Hi All

It has been an incredibly busy but hugely satisfying week. As we Informed you, 2 days ago a meeting was held that would be determine the issues that will be assessed in the Public Inquiry, that will give the decision on whether the windfarm at the Clashindarroch goes ahead. This is a development that we strongly believe will be catastrophic for the wildcats there.

The Scottish government who has received millions in EU and lottery funding to apparently save the wildcat and have previously declared the Clashindarroch a ‘Wildcat Wonderland’, had decided in their wisdom, not to object to this development. We all know and can deduce the appalling reasons for their lack of objection. Because of this lack of objection by the government, as it stood, the impact on wildcats would not have been considered. It was therefore left to our team of specialist lawyers and ecologists to put forward the case to the inquiry, that this impact needs to be fully assessed.

We are delighted to say that after representations made by our legal team, supported by expert ecologists, it has been decided that there will be a full session at the inquiry about the impact on wildcats. We now know that the Clashindarroch wildcats will have their voices heard.

It is sobering to think that without our representation, the wildcats in the forest would simply not be considered. They would be voiceless. It is deeply upsetting that there are many conservation organisations in Scotland who claim to save the wildcat and indeed profit off them, by using them in advertising. However many of these organisations are signed up to the government’s wildcat action plan which as we have shown you, has been used to facilitate logging activities. Despite all of these various conservation organisations being fully aware of the Clashindarroch wildcats, not one of them has been brave enough to stand up and question this windfarm development. Yet, many of these organisations have objected to other developments in Scotland, that impact on protected species.

It therefore looks like we stand alone, however we do not. We have nearly a million of you behind us and this gives us so much motivation. We are blessed that we also have an exceptional team of specialist legal and ecological experts and we can tell you that within this team, there is a steely determination to see this through to the end. Nothing will deter us.

An extremely important hurdle has been overcome and there will now be an inquiry season on the wildcat. However, now the really hard work starts as we will begin to put together the strongest case possible to stop this development.

As always we rely entirely on you, so if you want to donate to our vital legal challenge, you can do so at the following link:

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/wildcats/

Thanks as always.

The Wildcat Haven Team