Putting a value on wildlife

Evgeniy Yakhontov, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

The Guardian newspaper reported at the weekend that Bellway Homes has has been fined £600,000 for carrying out a demolition at a site inhabited by Soprano Pipistrelle bats.  Bellway also had to pay £30,000 costs and donated £20,000 to the Bat Conservation Trust.

They went ahead with the demolition even after being told they needed to obtain 'mitigation' and a licence from Natural England.

I would think/hope that's quite a lot of money, even for a housing developer.  

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