Proposal to designate Red Rocks and Longay as a Marine Protected Area: consultation analysis

Analysis of responses to our consultation on the proposal to designate Red Rocks and Longay as a Marine Protected Area which ran from 1 February 2022 to 26 April 2022.


2 Description of the responses and respondents

2.1 This chapter provides information about the respondents to the consultation and the responses submitted.

Number of responses received

2.2 The consultation received a total of 63 responses. All but one of the responses were submitted through the Scottish Government's online consultation hub. The remaining response was submitted by email.

2.3 Two respondents submitted two responses. In one case the respondent submitted two different online responses, while in the other case the respondent submitted an online response and a separate offline response (by email) providing further comment on the consultation questions. In both cases, the different responses received were amalgamated (with one response retained and one removed), ensuring that the respondents were counted only once in the analysis.

2.4 Thus, the analysis presented in this report is based on 61 responses (63 submitted responses minus 2 removed responses). See Table 2.1.

Table 2.1: Responses included in the analysis
Response type Number of responses received / removed
Responses submitted through Scottish Government consultation hub 62
Responses submitted by email 1
Responses combined (one response retained / one response removed) –2
Total responses included in the analysis 61

About the respondents

2.5 Responses were received from 17 organisations and 44 individuals (see Table 2.2).

Table 2.2: Responses included in the analysis, by respondent type
Respondent type Number Percent
Organisations 17 28%
Individuals 44 72%
Total 61 100%

Organisational respondents

2.6 Table 2.3 below presents details of the types of organisations that responded to the consultation. The organisations fell into two main categories of (i) environmental organisations and community groups (accounting for around three-quarters of organisational respondents – 13 out of 17 organisations) and (ii) fishing industry bodies (accounting for the remaining quarter – 4 out of 17 organisations).

2.7 The environmental organisations group included international, national and local bodies; it also included organisations with a focus on environmental protection and nature conservation, as well as those with a broader interest in achieving 'sustainable' marine environments (i.e. ensuring protection of the natural environment alongside appropriately managed commercial and leisure activities). The fishing industry organisations comprised three organisations related to mobile fishing activities and one organisation related to static fishing activities. See also Annex 1 for a full list of organisational respondents.

Table 2.3: Organisational respondents, by type
Organisation type Number Percent
Environmental organisations and community groups 13 76%
Fishing industry organisations 4 24%
Total 17 100%

Response rate to individual questions

2.8 Annex 2 provides details of the number (and percentage) of organisational and individual respondents who replied to each consultation question. The table shows a high level of response to all the closed questions – each of these was answered by 58 or more respondents (out of a total of 61). The response to the open questions was more varied with the number of respondents providing comments ranging from 24 at Question 7 to 49 at the open part of Question 1. At each of the open questions organisations were more likely than individuals to provide comments.

Contact

Email: marine_biodiversity@gov.scot

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