Roadkill on motorways and major roads in Scotland: EIR release

Information requested

The following information around roadkill on motorways and major roads in Scotland.

Please provide -

1. The number of recorded dead animals found on roads from January 2022 to date. Please break down the figures by animal type.
2. Where (by road name) each recorded incident took place.
3. How many recorded dead animals were removed by the authorities after being reported.
4. How much money was spent per year for the removal of dead animals from the road.

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.

Response

To aid with my response I have retained the numbering from your request above.

1&2) Please see Annex A to this response for the numbers of dead animals which were recorded on the trunk road network. As requested, this has been broken down by animal type and road number.

3) All of the dead animals recorded on the network were removed from the trunk road.

4) Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held), Transport Scotland is not required to provide information which it does not have. We do not have the information you have requested because the removal of dead animals is not charged separately, rather the cost is included in the monthly lump sums paid by Transport Scotland to their Operating Companies for a range of services.

This exception 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 exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about the removal of dead animals from the trunk road network, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

202300355447 Annex A - Roadkill figures

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6 page PDF

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