In response to our depositing dead dolphins on Defra's doorstep (yes, I know there's a lot of Ds in there) Ben Bradshaw, the Minister for Nature Conservation and Fisheries, seemed to get a bit annoyed. So annoyed in fact that he hot-footed it over to the nearest TV studio to denounce it as a 'silly stunt'. He announced the latest strandings figures which he said showed a decrease in dolphins washing up on beaches - and tried to claim this as a government success.

I thought I might respond to this - I'm sure at least someone in Defra must be a keen weblog-reader. Let's be clear - Greenpeace is resorting to taking action because governments (including the UK) aren't doing enough.

We are taking action here in the UK - where years of damning evidence of the death toll wrought by the bass pair trawl fishery have meant nothing. We are taking action in France, as well as at the French Embassy in London. We are also taking action in the Channel (where the dolphins are getting killed) against UK and French vessels. And we're lobbying the EU Commissioner. If the governments responsible had done what they should have done by now and banned this fishery we wouldn't have to be doing this.

No one involved in recovering, and delivering those dolphins saw it as a silly stunt. For some it was the most heart-wrenching thing they'd ever done - but they volunteered to take part because they know that we need to hold our politicians accountable.

For me, even though I've seen a fair few of these corpses now, it was very difficult too. Those three dolphins represented how bycatch cuts straight across the populations - indiscrimately killing healthy animals. That the dolphins looked so alive in death made it an upsetting and nauseating experience.

Sights as grisly and gruesome as this are encountered regularly by ordinary members of the public walking on beaches around our coasts. EU governments have a duty to protect these species - they aren't doing this.

If you want a prime example of a 'silly stunt' and government spin - Ben Bradshaw announced a ban on pair trawling in an area where practically none of it happens, effectively pushing the problem further out to sea, in the knowledge that the further out to sea a dolphin is killed, the less chance there is of it ever reaching the shore.

Willie, Campaigner