Best Practice Steering Group:
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Welcome
New Guides
Welcome to the new-look Best Practice Web site. The first new Best Practice Guides on Habitat Impact Assessment are now available. These are located in the Impacts section and download versions of these are available on the relevant pages. The whole of Best Practice is being completely re-vamped presently. As such, all previously published guides have been removed and will be replaced with new material regularly over the next few months. Unavailable pages remain greyed outgreyed out until they go live. We intend have to the full collection of guides completed by March 2008. Coming shortly is the Firearms section, so please come back soon and we thank you for your patience meantime!
Background
The Best Practice Guides are produced by a Steering Group comprising DCS, the Association of Deer Management Groups, the British Association of Shooting and Conservation, the British Deer Society, Forestry Commission (Scotland), the Scottish Gamekeepers Association and LANTRA.
The guides are designed as a reference source and management tool, and are presented in a format that is easily accessible to all practitioners within the deer industry. The Steering Group have designed the guides to assist people currently in training and education, those seeking vocational qualifications, and people already established within the industry who want to update their skills.
The purpose of Best Practice Guidance is to:
- Allow practitioners to feel that they are on safe ground when following the guidance.
- Provide information to support rational and considered management based on best current information.
- Help DCS satisfy themselves that an individual is a fit and competent person to receive an authorisation.
- Provide support to those seeking vocational qualifications.
New developments
Best Practice is dynamic and aims to provide practitioners with the most up to date information available. In order to be able to respond effectively to change, we have altered the way in which the guides are structured and the way guides will be issued.
Changes to guide structure and format
Best Practice is constantly being updated to incorporate changes that reflect political as well as legislative changes. The revisions include the need to make practitioners aware of the procedures that
- are a legal requirement,
- are required to safeguard public safety, food safety & animal welfare, &
- are required to carry out a task effectively.
These symbols have been used to highlight information throughout the new guides. The guides will also include background text highlighting advantages and disadvantages associated with deer management methods, provide examples of situations where the method is appropriate and will include details of procedures which reduce costs, effort and time, or represent an ideal option if there are no constraints on time or money.
Changes to the publication and issue of guides
In order that we can deliver our original commitment to deliver the full Best Practice Guidance series in the most efficient and cost-effective way, we have changed the manner in which Best Practice is published. Instead of periodically receiving sets of laminated guidance, all subscribers will receive one complete and final up-to-date set of glossy laminated guidance on completion of the project, scheduled for March 2008. In the meantime, guides will continue to be published on this web site [use the links to the left for a full list of guide topics or the sitemap to see which are ready. You will also find electronic copies of the guides on the relevant pages]. The Web allows publication of guides the minute they have been approved and provides a medium where guides can be easily accessed, downloaded and printed-out by subscribers to add to the Best Practice Folder, whilst they await the final complete set. The Web also allows guides to continue to be amended where necessary, ensuring information is the most up to date possible, right up to the final set.
Subscribing to Best Practice
Best Practice Guidance is available to download free of charge on the Web. If however, you would like to receive the final set of glossy laminated guides, for a fee of £15 (which covers postage and packing) you can subscribe to Best Practice. Click on this link for further details and a Subcription form.