86% of Britons Say Conservation Charities Should Publish Impact Reports

In news that should send a shiver down the spine of the RSPB, a staggering 86% of UK adults think that conservation charities which receive public funding should be required to publish impact results of their work.

This is according to a recent YouGov omnibus poll, which surveyed 2,281 UK adults between 8th and 9th June. Just 3% of those surveyed said that charities in receipt of public funding should not have to publicise the results of their conservation work. Currently there is no legal requirement for these organisations to do so.

Despite the polarising times we live in, support for public accountability of conservation charities cuts across all political affiliations, age groups, geographies and genders. 90% of both Conservative and Labour voters agreed with the principle, as did 91% of Reform voters. Even a vast majority of Londoners (87%) support the idea of conservation charities being held to greater account.

In Wales, 87% agreed that conservation groups should have to publish impact reports – an idea that will no doubt be reinforced by the recent findings of Professor Simon Denny about the RSPB’s disastrous stewardship of the Lake Vyrnwy Nature Reserve in Powys.

Once an area of managed moorland that was teeming with rare bird species, Lake Vyrnwy has become an “avian desert” in the years since the charity took over control of the reserve in 1996.

Breeding populations of important species – including hen harrier, merlin, black grouse, red grouse, curlew, and peregrine falcons – have all collapsed. In 2023 there were just three single adult curlew in the reserve and one ‘possible nest’; down from 32 breeding pairs in 1980. Meanwhile, 44% of the heather moorland that once surrounded the lake has been lost since 1946.

“The Welsh Government’s support to the RSPB to enable it to bid for funds must be questioned, given the outcomes achieved at Lake Vyrnwy, and the limited resources that the RPSB puts into managing the reserve,” Professor Denny observes.

As a reminder, in 2024 the RSPB received £14.79 million in government grants. That same year, the number of lekking black grouse at Lake Vyrnwy numbered just seven – less than half of the charity’s own target of 15.

Professor Denny compares these conservation results to those on managed moorlands, which are privately funded, receive little-to-no taxpayer money, and achieve better results for rare bird species while propping up the local economy of UK uplands.  

“Estate owners and farmers certainly put more of their own time and money into managing their moorland than the RSPB does at Lake Vyrnwy, while receiving much less funding from the Welsh Government and other bodies for habitat improvement works,” he concludes.

Now imagine if the RSPB had to admit that…