Gradings for Scottish salmon rivers: EIR release
Information request and response under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004.
Information requested
Please find below an extract of the proposed gradings for Scottish salmon rivers from 2020 to 2025 as detailed on the website.
I would like to obtain the same data from 2015/6 to 2019 so I can plot changes since the inception of the conservation limit policy.
Response
As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.
This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.
I enclose a copy of all of the information you requested in the attached spreadsheets. This information has been sourced from assessments from both 2017 and 2020, but have been formatted in new tables for ease of reading.
The Conservation of Salmon regulations were introduced in 2016, and the data provided covers this period to 2019, as you outlined in your request.
Please note, in previous years we have referred to Grades 1, 2 and 3 to explain the river gradings assessment. However to enable greater understanding and clarity amongst our stakeholders and general public interests, we have since moved to describe these as:
- good conservation status (G) which was formerly known as Grade/Category 1
- moderate conservation status (M) which was formerly known as Grade/Category 2
- poor conservation status (P) which was formerly known as Grade/Category 3 and therefore subject to mandatory catch and release
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Contact
Please quote the FOI reference
Central Correspondence Unit
Email: contactus@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000
The Scottish Government
St Andrew's House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG