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Mr. Soames
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will order a cormorant cull. [9599]
Mr. Morley
Cormorants are protected by the 1979 EC birds directive, implemented in the UK by the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. This Act provides for them to be shot under licence in strictly limited numbers in cases where they are causing serious damage to a fishery and where there is no other satisfactory solution. There are no powers to undertake a general cull.