professorkamrankhan@gmail.com 
News reports today (10 July) announce that it is the government’s intention to ban the use of lead shot, with a three-year phase-out period.
The Environment Minister, Emma Hardy, announced that the government will outlaw shot containing more than 1% lead, and bullets containing more than 3% lead.
The government says that it aims to have the legislation in place by the Summer of 2026, with the three-year phase-out to begin at the same time, in order to give the shooting industry time to adapt to different types of shot.
As detailed in Animal Aid’s Killing Our Countryside report, it has been estimated that more than 7,000 tonnes of lead ammunition are discharged into the countryside every year, poisoning waterways and killing animals. Lead ammunition poisons up to 400,000 wildfowl in the UK every winter, causing untold suffering and, of these, up to 100,000 wildfowl are killed annually from ingesting lead gunshot.
For years, the shooting industry has resisted bringing in a self-imposed ban on lead shot. In 2020, whilst still opposing a ban in law, nine UK shooting organisations agreed a voluntary transition away from the use of lead shot over a five-year period, to be completed by 2025. However, due to lack of movement from the shooting sector, in December 2024, the UK Health and Safety Executive published its recommendation for a lead ammunition ban and presented it to the government.
So here we are – five years after a voluntary ban has failed, and with legislation due to be completed in 2026, allowing shooters a further three years to phase out the use of lead shot.
Whilst it is welcome news, it means that the land and animals will continue to be poisoned until 2029, and, as the Raptor Persecution website notes, compliance with the new legislation is the key issue – not least for an industry which seems wholly unable to police itself.
Let us hope that, for many who indulge in the cruel ‘hobby’ of shooting live animals for fun, the transition to non-lead shot will prove to be too much bother and that they will take up a new pastime which does not involve killing the countryside. Until then we will continue to campaign for a total ban on the shooting of animals.
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