§ Norman BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many sightings there have been since June 2001 purporting to be of big cats, broken down by county; what steps have been taken to investigate these; and on how many occasions it has been concluded that a big cat probably was present. [99220]
§ Mr. MorleyBig cats, such as tigers, lions, cheetahs, leopards or puma, are not native to the UK and are not naturally found in the wild in this country. There are widespread and frequent reported possible sightings but, despite investigations, the Department is not aware of any confirmed instances of big cats of unknown origin being found out of captivity in England in the last 20 years. The lack of hard evidence (such as captured animals, corpses or photographs) is hard to reconcile with the number of reported sightings, unless people are genuinely but frequently mistaken with their identification.
The Department does investigate claims of big cat sightings where there is a potential risk to possible livestock predation. Where livestock deaths are involved and it is likely that hard evidence could be obtained to identify the predator, a field visit may be conducted. However, the Department does not systematically record all alleged sightings.
Since June 2001, the Department's Rural Development Service (RDS) have had 22 cases of alleged big cats reported to them connected to possible livestock predation and where there was potentially hard evidence to follow up. There have been two field visits in relation to these reports. The counties for these reports were: Buckinghamshire; Cornwall; Devon (three); Essex (three); Kent; Norfolk; North Somerset (two); North Yorkshire; Oxfordshire; Shropshire; Staffordshire; Suffolk; Surrey (two); Warwickshire; West Midlands; and Wiltshire. In many cases the details of the report provide insufficient circumstantial evidence to justify the expense of a field visit. However, should a field visit be deemed necessary, a trained wildlife biologist carries out detailed searches for various types of evidence such as examining the body in the field for evidence of how it had been killed or checking for footprints. In none of the field visits could any evidence be found to confirm the presence of big cats.
Release of big cats into the wild is prohibited under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 and possession of these species is regulated under the Dangerous Wild Animals Act 1976. If there is believed to be a public safety issue, for example from an escaped big cat, then this is a matter for the police.