The league for the abolition of hunting promotes a class-action in defense of landowners: "Never paid, in the last decade, the amount required by law"; in Lombardy 89 million euros for 2011 alone.
It is an unprecedented campaign, a frontal attack presented just on the eve of the opening of the season (scheduled for tomorrow) that the hunting abolition League has decided to launch to the hunting world.
This time it is not a question of appeals to the TAR or complaints to the European Commission against the hunting policies of regions such as Lombardy, Veneto or Tuscany, but of a simple, albeit potentially colossal "debt recovery". Which in Lombardy alone, and for the current year alone, would amount to 89 million and 390 thousand euros.
These are the economic contents of an article of the national hunting law, the 157 of 1992, which has never been applied. "The Lombardy Region, together with all the others - explains Lac - has never implemented article 15 of law 157, according to which" a contribution is due to the owners or tenants of the land on which the hunting activity is carried out to be determined by the regional administration in relation to the extension, the agronomic conditions, the measures aimed at protecting and enhancing the environment "; an expense which must be met with the regional hunting concession tax.
"The law of the State - adds the association - provides in summary that if you want to hunt on other people's land, the Regions must pay an allowance to all owners". The problem, according to Lac, is that so far everyone has "forgotten" about this norm.
"If we consider a medium-low allowance of 70 euros per year per hectare (equal to 0,007 per square meter), multiplied by the hectares on which they hunt, which in Lombardy are one million and 277 thousand, it turns out that the Pirellone would have had to pay the owners of the land for the current year alone 89 million and 390 thousand euros. And if we still consider that nothing has been paid so far - continues the association -, the arrears of ten years amount to over 890 million euros, excluding interest, only for Lombardy. Which means - again according to Lac - that hunters will have to shell out the sums due by paying very high concession fees to the Regions, and not the derisory amount of about 64 euros per year ”.
Having drawn up the framework, Lac has begun to collect the adhesions of the owners and tenants of the funds (included in 80% of the agro-forestry-pastoral territory, Tasp) open to hunting, "by launching a civil class-action in the interest of owners and managers and against all regions to obtain payment of the "hunting fee" for 2011 and for the ten outstanding years. Lombardy should be the first reality to move, thanks to the law firm of Claudio Linzola, in charge of sponsoring all interested parties. Meanwhile, Lac is asking for the immediate suspension of all hunting activities as long as the sums due by law are not paid ”.
Source: Bresciaoggi.it