Public consultation on UK Dolphin and Porpoise Conservation Strategy

UPDATE: This consultation has now closed. HWDT REsponded to the consultation in collaboration with our conservation partners in Environment Links UK. You can read our full response here.

The Scottish Government is currently running a public consultation and is seeking your views on a new UK Dolphin and Porpoise Conservation Strategy. The strategy aims to support the conservation of nine of the most commonly seen cetaceans in UK waters.

HWDT has engaged with the development of the strategy and attended a stakeholder meeting to provide comment on the draft document in 2018. Following this feedback, we are delighted to see that minke whales have now been added to the strategy and to see the strategy progress to a public consultation.

Developed by the Scottish Government in collaboration with UK Government counterparts and the UK Statutory Nature Conservation Bodies, the strategy aims to achieve and/or maintain the favourable conservation status for dolphins, porpoises and minke whales in UK waters. The strategy identifies pressures on the populations of these species and aims to prioritise the management of pressures that pose the greatest risk. A series of action plans are proposed to address these pressures and maintain conservation status.

Mobile species, such as whales, dolphins and porpoises are particularly challenging to protect as they don’t often stay in one place. It is important therefore that regional protection is supplemented by wider measures at a national and international scale. The strategy will provide an important conservation framework at a UK level.

Thanks to all those who joined us last night for our Online Talk about the UK Dolphin and Porpoise Strategy. It was a brilliant evening of interesting discussion around the strategy and we hope it encouraged you to have your say and tell your friends to submit a response too.

This consultation is a brilliant opportunity for you to have your say in how cetaceans in the UK are monitored and protected for years to come. We hope that all stakeholders will take the opportunity to respond to this consultation to voice their views, so that the best possible outcome can be reached for whales, dolphins, porpoises and coastal communities.

We will be providing our feedback on the strategy in collaboration with our conservation partners in Environment Links UK and will publish our response as soon as it is available.

The consultation papers and online submission form can all be accessed by clicking the link below and responses can be made until 23:59 14th June 2021. If you have anything you would like to ask our team, please get in touch on info@hwdt.org.