On Tuesday 27 January during the evening session of the Natural Environment Bill’s third and final phase, Scottish Green Mark Ruskell’s swift brick amendment 141 was passed into law, unanimously and met with a round of applause.
Scottish tory Tim Eagle MSP said of campaigner Hannah Bourne-Taylor:
“I’ve never seen a champion work so hard.”
Mark Ruskell MSP said:
“I’m delighted to have worked with Hannah and her army of campaigners to get this commitment to swift bricks into Scottish legislation.
“Swifts join our communities every Summer, but they are becoming rarer everywhere. I’m looking forward to seeing every new building in Scotland host a family of swifts in the future and I hope the legislation here will inspire law makers across the UK to get on with it and give swifts a home.
“It’s been frustrating watching Westminster take years to consider something so simple yet so important. The conversation on this has been good at Holyrood and while there were some challenges to getting this in place the government listened, and we found a way through pretty quickly.”
Campaigner Hannah Bourne-Taylor said:
“What a landmark victory! Thank you Scotland, for showing England how it’s done, taking six weeks to do what successive governments in England have failed to do in four years, proving how easy it would be for the Labour Government to secure cavity nesting habitat by mandating swift bricks instead of offering a toothless policy that has no statutory weight. Scotland joins Gibraltar and The Netherlands in this critical, urgent action.
“To stand a fighting chance, our swifts need Westminster, the Senedd and the Stormont to mandate swift bricks to secure cavity nesting habitat for swifts and all birds reliant on this increasingly lost habitat that we’re inadvertently destroying. Swifts have existed for 50 million years and to keep calling Britain home, they need a simple brick with a hole in it.”
“This win belongs to the brilliant Mark Ruskell MSP, shared with the cross party politicians in Scotland who have united for birds and the countless Brits who have been asking for governmental help to save swifts’ homes and their future, for years.”
Lord (Zac) Goldsmith said:
“Scotland’s decisive action to mandate swift bricks illustrates the need and opportunity for England to do the same instead of relying on guidance.”
Environment Minister of Gibraltar, Professor John Cortes said:
“Scotland’s decision on swift bricks is a significant step in ensuring the survival of this species, which has come to depend so much on us. On the ‘Rock’ we have had this policy for several decades and we have seen a declining population of swifts first stabilise and then increase. Well done Scotland! Now others have to follow.”
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