BY SARAH GREENWOOD
A note follows from Sarah to Dai Bradley (pictured twice below), who played Billy Casper in Barry Hines’ film ‘Kes’. Sarah met Dai/Billy at a showing of Hines’ film The Gamekeeper in Barnsley last month.
Ay up Billy! Asta got tahm for a chat? A’ just want t’ clear summat up after that talk we ‘ed ‘t’other neet. at’t Civic It wor at that showing o’t ‘Gamekeeper’, written by thi mate Barry Hines. Wi wor chattin’ abaht it, and tha said tha didn’t like ‘t violence that ‘appened in’t countryside. Cos it w’ant tahm or’t place ah let it drop, burrits been botherin’ me, so a’ just thowt ahd like t’explain why wi do what wi do, an’ a bit moor beside. A’ can understand why tha feels like tha does after your Judd killed thi bird, Kes. Times’ve changed though Billy, an’ whilst a lot o’ aspects of a ‘keeper’s working life’ve stayed ‘t same, a lots changed, an’ a’ think tha’ll find it’s for’t better.
“Hello Billy! Have you got time for a chat? I just want to clear something up after that talk we had the other evening at The Civic in Barnsley. It was at the showing of ‘The Gamekeeper’, written by your friend, Barry Hines. We were talking about the film and you said you didn’t like the violence, connected with wildlife that happened in the countryside. I let this drop because it wasn’t the time or place, but it’s been bothering me, so I just thought I’d like to explain why we (‘keepers, pest controllers and farmers) do what we do, and a bit more besides. I can understand why you feel like you do after your brother, Judd, killed your kestrel, Kes, but times have changed and whilst a lot of aspects of a ‘keeper’s working life have stayed the same, lots of practices have changed, and I think you’ll see it’s for the better.’’
Everything that George Purse did in this film, The Gamekeeper, is still done today, but Barry Hines wrote the story looking through the prism of class and exploitation.
What he didn’t do was give any context or background to George’s daily activities and show that they were rooted in practical ways of ensuring healthy birds and land management. Barry tied in the lives of working class people at the time with exploitation by the powerful, in this case the life lived by George Purse, Head Gamekeeper, and ‘the Duke’, his employer. In turn it portrayed George’s treatment of his friends and family in reflecting the hierarchical attitudes still prevalent in the society of the time.
The film shows a symbiotic reflection of power and position by using the countryside and its management as surrogates, with George the ‘keeper having ‘power’ over his fiefdom, in the same way that the Duke and his land agents had power over George and dictated his life and, by extension, the way the working class at the time were used and treated by their employers and the avenues that were or weren’t open to them to mitigate their situation, e.g., from recourse to union action, to minor crimes like poaching to supplement income, to trespassing for a bit of light entertainment and so on.
In the last forty years there has been a massive social revolution, the breaking of the unions, free market economy, the rise of the internet with its benefits of information, education, marketing and work opportunities but also its dark side of cyber crime and disinformation, peddled to garner power, prestige and money, and this is why the land management practices of gamekeepers and landowners themselves have been vilified and lead to persecution by those who have no actual practical knowledge of the countryside, whilst at the same time ignoring the acknowledged benefits that ‘keepers and land managers have brought to the land they live on and care for. The RSPB being one of the biggest purveyors of disinformation, yet its own reserve management cannot live up to its hype and there is a continual begging for public grant funding to remedy the self made problems on those reserves, yet privately-owned shoots pay for their own management and requirements and produce a much higher quality of land and wildlife species.
Over the last forty years many people’s standard of living has risen from that into which they were born, with many now able to own their own homes with pony paddocks or be members of shoots with some owning their own shoots. They are able to take regular foreign holidays, buy new carpets and furniture, run expensive vehicles and generally live the life that the ‘Duke’ and his friends lived in the film. There is evidence to show that they still identify as ‘working class’, but over the last forty years attitudes have, to a large degree, homogenised and social interaction is now much less deferential between people with the same goals.
Conversely, times have changed for many of the ‘upper class’, with land, property and works of art having to be sold off to finance repairs to homes; to conserve what they have left. Wentworth Woodhouse, Wortley Hall, and Stainborough, aka Wentworth Castle, all of which were the main locations in The Gamekeeper, have been sold off. Wentworth Woodhouse being taken over by a preservation society, with no family member left living there and the title dying out at the time The Gamekeeper was made. The Estate land and smaller properties are now run as a business and still have both pheasant and grouse shoots. Wortley Hall, ironically, was sold off to a collective of individuals, trades unions and others from the Labour movement and is now run to ‘educate’, host meetings and other social functions for members of the trades union and Labour movement. There is currently a family member living in the village and the Estate is run on a commercial basis. Stainborough/ Wentworth Castle was sold to Barnsley Education Committee in 1948 by its owner, and is now home to the Northern College for Residential and Community Education. All these changes have given the public the opportunity to enjoy and benefit from areas that previously had been denied to them.
Land management over the last forty years has also moved on. Wildlife, raptors for example, that were once killed because they compromised gamebirds are now favoured species and numbers are increasing on shooting estates because of the land management and predator control that is provided. These management techniques also benefit songbirds and other fauna and flora, and there are increasing numbers of red and amber listed species that are thriving on ‘keepered land.
Keeping trespassers off the land was done by George for good reasons, and is still discouraged today. The British public has a lot more access to land now than it did, and the ‘right to roam’ applies to mountains, moorland, heaths and downland, for leisure purposes. But many areas of privately owned land are kept private for good reasons, and that is to avoid disturbing the wildlife that lives there. Ground nesting birds, and other creatures are easily disturbed and driven away by intruders with nests left abandoned. A place cannot be ‘wild’ if it’s continually being disturbed by well meaning visitors.
Poaching is another word for theft. If food on the shelf in a supermarket is taken without being paid for, it is classed as theft. There is no difference between that and edible wildlife, particularly game, taken by a ‘poacher’ from private land. Forty years ago I was told by a shoot owner that nobody was bothered if a man took a pheasant or rabbit for his own pot, but the trouble started when it was big numbers that were being taken illicitly for resale, leaving the shoot owner out of pocket.
The ‘countryside violence’ that you referred to, and prompted me to talk to you about, I guess, is the shooting, humane snaring and trapping, that all play a part in effectively controlling predatory species that deplete rare breeds, and are practices allowed by law. They are regulated by legislation and guided by best practice codes with many conservation bodies, for example, the RSPB, using them. These methods are used on foxes, carrion and hooded crows, stoats, weasels, rats and feral cats. The numbers of these predators vary by area and the aim is to control them by the most effective means for the job and in the most humane way. It must be done selectively so only the target species is caught. Shooting, whilst it looks and sounds violent, is the quickest way to dispatch a predator and they will be dead before the noise of the discharge gets to them. There is no cruelty in a quick death.
Shooting and various traps and snares are all regulated means of killing predators with training recommended in all regions and mandatory in some parts of UK.
Predator control has always been part of land management, including being part of the ‘keeper’s remit, and has to be done because the world has created an environment where generalist predators, those that take many different kinds of prey, thrive, and harm the conservation status of other species. Reducing predators improves the breeding success and numbers of prey species, and is important for red and amber listed species. More information can be found here.
The birds shot aren’t wasted, on the contrary they are destined for the food chain and go to restaurants, supermarkets and game dealers. They have lived a free -range life in their natural surroundings, and in that respect are better off than farmed birds and livestock. Game bird meat is higher in protein, has lower calories and significantly less fat than chicken and has high levels of iron, vitamin B6 and selenium. Despite the cost of producing it, game is no more expensive than free-range poultry. The other social benefit is the employment it provides in isolated areas of the country during the winter months with beating, picking up, accommodation for shooting parties, as well as the trade done with local businesses that service the shooting industry, which is worth 2 billion pounds.
So tha sees Billy, Barry Hines didn’t gi’t full picture behind what George did in his working life. ‘e did what he had to do for ‘t same reasons back then, but since then folk’ve wanted moor access t’t land and moor ‘umane ways of managin’t land an’ these’ve been researched and put inta practice. Nah Billy, wi moor equal, wi can do moor, wiv got a say in’t job! Us that live this life aren’t bad, wi think abaht’t job and wi do what’s best as much as wi can, and wi allus lookin’ for better ways, even though wi look like wi stuck in’t past.
Sarah Greenwood has farmed in Yorkshire all her life, has a general interest in fieldsports, but particularly in hunting. She runs Phoenix Aid working in Bosnia and Kosovo.