Bats vs people

Imagine: it’s Sunday morning, and the warden of a medieval village church arrives to get the place ready for communion only to find the altar covered in bat droppings.

As he gets scrubbing, he reflects on how he rang the officials at Natural England to request help getting rid of these bats — ‘Perhaps they could be relocated somewhere?’ he asked innocently — but their response was to read him the riot act about his responsibilities to the bats under EU law.

To fulfil its obligations, the church had to install a leaded ‘bat flap’ to let the creatures in and out — a dedicated window the bats can use to come and go as they please. And because the church is a Grade I listed building, it had to have one made up in the same material as the rest of the windows, at a cost of several hundred pounds.

Worse, the church has had to pay thousands to have an official bat survey done, to assess the extent and nature of their bat population. The vicar has been on the phone to the Bat Welfare Society helpline for more hours than he cares to remember to ensure he doesn’t incur a fine or prison sentence for disturbing the creatures. He now sets aside part of his week to liaise with the Church of England’s ‘bat working group’. The proceeds of the collection plate are pretty much entirely spent on bat management.

The bats, meanwhile, show no signs of gratitude and are urinating and defecating on the medieval wall paintings. The ammonia from their waste is eroding the precious brasses. The people who use the church — the congregation, playgroups, old people’s lunch clubs and evening classes — are not all that keen on having bats fly above their heads as they do pilates or sing ‘Jerusalem’, but what do they matter? While the bats are covered by the ironclad EU habitat directive, there is no equivalent law protecting heritage artefacts, community buildings, or indeed people.