NATURE CONSERVANCY COUNCIL
Great Britain Headquarters
Northminster House. Peterborough PEI IUA Telephone Peterborough (733) 40345
୮
John Robbins Esq
Wildlife Division
Department of the Environment
MRE
Tollgate House
Houlton Street
BRISTOL
BS2 9DJ
L
Dear John
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RECEIVED IN REGISTRY
24 JUN 1988
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Our Ref: IA22/01/25
16 June 1988
BANC/WWF(UK) REPORT 'FRAGMENTS OF PARADISE; A GUIDE FOR CONSERVATION ACTION IN THE UK DEPENDENT TERRITORIES'
I wrote to you on 28 October 1987 in response to your request of 26 October for briefing for your submission to Lord Belstead concerning the BANC/WWF (UK) letter to him of 20 October seeking a Government response to their report 'Fragments of Paradise'. Although the 20 October letter was copied to my Chairman, we do not seem to have received a copy of your Minister's reply. Although I appreciate that Ministerial responsibility for the issues addressed in the report is divided between DoE and FCO, I assume that some response has been issued in the intervening 8 months, and I would be grateful for a copy of it.
As you are aware, some of the Report's recommendations were addressed specifically to NCC. My Branch has been considering these with colleagues, but we have refrained from formulating any formal response pending an indication from you as to the Government's view on main recommendation No 2 on page 61 advocating the establishment of a liaison group of appropriate UK Government Agencies (see penultimate paragraph of my letter to you on 28 October). We have not heard
not heard anything from you or FCO on this nor any elucidation of the point highlighted in chapter 3 of the Report (page 34, end of second paragraph under 'liaison and UK Committee for IUCN') relating to the 'grey area' concerning the extent of NCC's remit vis-a-vis the Dependent Territories.
As you know, the NGOs constituted their Forum on 3 November 1987, following the launch of the Report, and
and have met several times subsequently. I understand they intend to approach the UK Government in the near future in order to press for a full response to the Report. In the light of this, I thought you would find it helpful to have the preliminary response of officials to the points concerning NCC raised in the Report. This will form the basis of our discussions with concerned NGOs.
1.
We welcome the Report as a first comprehensive attempt to draw together existing information on the conservation of biological diversity in the Dependent Territories.
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