Wildlife Trust chief faces calls to quit over hunting and shooting sponsorships

Critics say role as chairman of conservation charity conflicts with support for ‘bloodsports’

Kent police dropped an investigation into the death of a fox, saying it was accidental (East Kent Sabs)

The head of a conservation charity is facing increasing pressure to step down because of his firm’s sponsorship of hunts and game bird shoots.

Critics say Michael Bax’s position as chairman of the Kent Wildlife Trust is at odds with his support for activities that involve loss of wildlife.

More than 200,000 people have signed a petition calling for the trust to sever its links with Mr Bax, who served as huntsman and joint master for a hare-hunting group, supports other hunts and allows pheasant shooting on his farm.

Wildlife lovers are also planning to protest at Saturday’s annual general meeting of Kent Wildlife Trust to demand his removal.

“The wildlife trust’s mission and decisions are based on science, but his experience of animals isn’t science-based, it’s about a love of hunting,” said Tom Fitton, who launched the petition.

“All evidence suggests the brown hare has suffered a massive decline, and his experience doesn’t give any confidence in his suitability to run the trust.”

But the trust says Mr Bax is pivotal to maintaining good relations with landowners and farmers.

Mr Bax became chairman of hare-hunting group the Blean Beagles in 1971, and took over the reins at Kent Wildlife Trust in April 2014.

The trust says he left the Blean Beagles in 2005, but Baily’s Hunt Directory, the “hunting bible”, reported him leaving in 2016 – two years after he took the trust top job.

He is also director and senior partner of BTF Partnership, a land and property agent.

In July 2014, three months after he became Kent Wildlife Trust chairman, BTF sponsored a Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust event, advertised as a “game bird challenge shoot and sporting auction” with three 100-bird sporting flushes per team and an auction of sporting lots. Participants had to send applications to join BTF.

As well as pheasant and pigeon shooting, the lots included a “tide flight” on Greenborough Marshes, an environmentally sensitive area in Kent. A tide flight is a bird shoot around the time of high tides on marshland, when birds and ducks are at their most active.

Last year BTF sponsored the pony club of Southdown and Eridge Hunt, a hunt that in 2015 was accused by the deputy mayor of Lewes during a council meeting of having a 10-year “history of violent acts”. The pony club fundraises for the hunt.

Also last year the Ashford Valley Tickham Hunt thanked BTF among others for sponsorship.

In May this year police dropped an investigation into an alleged illegal hunt by the Ashford Valley after detectives said they did not have enough evidence.

Saboteurs captured footage of a fox being chased by hounds and its corpse later being carried away by a terrier man. Police deemed the death an accident.

At the time, Ashford Valley Tickham Hunt declined to comment.

Mr Fitton’s petition says: “Many wading birds are included on the ‘birds of conservation concern review’ and that the chairman of Kent Wildlife Trust would sponsor their slaughter is unthinkable.

“Bax’s shoots will also be polluting the environment with lead. Exposure to lead is not only detrimental to the growth and reproductive rates of animals and plants, but it also has adverse effects on human health. BTF continue to sponsor shoots taking place in Kent in 2018.”

The petition says the brown hare is a priority species on both Kent’s and the UK’s biodiversity action plan because of a dramatic decline in numbers caused by agricultural practices and hunting.

“According to the Hare Preservation Trust, the UK’s brown hare population has declined by 80 per cent since 1880; numbers are low in Kent.

“Bax does not represent the views of Kent Wildlife Trust’s membership who pay their fees to protect wildlife, not to slaughter it for pleasure.”

One of Bax’s business partners, Stuart Sillars, was listed by Baily’s as joint master of the Blean Beagles in 2006, and by Horse & Hound in 2014-15, and is thought to still be linked with the group.

Kent Wildlife Trust has a statement on its website, attributed to John Bennett, the chief executive, saying: “We recognise the level of concern reflected in the scale of the response to this petition.

“In order to work with the widest possible community, we remain neutral on the personal positions of our 30,000 members, 1,056 volunteers and trustees with regards to hunting, fishing and field sports.

“We don’t allow hunting on our nature reserves where we have control of the shooting rights.

“Wildlife Trusts like ourselves do raise concerns and challenge aspects of field sports and hunting where they have a damaging impact on the conservation of the county’s populations of wild animals and plants.

“For the trust to achieve our objective of protecting wildlife and wild habitats we must work closely with landowners, farmers and the wider rural community, many of whom participate in field sports as well as being active conservationists.

“Mike Bax’s commitment to the trust over 30 years has proved invaluable in helping us to nurture these relations, which over the last five years has seen us manage and advise on nearly 31,000 acres of land across Kent for the benefit of wildlife and the public.”

KWT’s site adds: “Claims and images have been used on social media to imply that Mike Bax runs a pheasant shoot on his farm. Mike Bax purchased Street End Wood, next to his farm, in 2007 at which time the local shoot was already in place on this land. The shoot has continued with Mike Bax’s permission, but he plays no part in its management, nor does he receive income from the shoot.

“Mike Bax makes land available to the shoot along with five neighbouring landowners.”

Mr Bax, who was High Sheriff of Kent in 2012-13, was also chairman of Kent Police’s Crime Rural Advisory Group.

A spokesman added: “Nature is in trouble and wildlife is under ever-increasing pressure. Kent Wildlife Trust wants to achieve the greatest conservation impact possible over the biggest area it can.

“Kent Wildlife Trust aims to work across Kent with people who hold a variety of views, uniting them under the common cause of restoring nature.”

The petition adds: “The chairman of Kent Wildlife Trust should be a role model. If Bax continues to inspire and endorse bloodsports, our environment weakens. Any good that he does does not give him any special right to go against the trust’s mission statement.”

Mr Bax did not respond to a request to comment.