Hard-up Moray Council will potentially have to spend up to £15,000 to help settle a long-running dispute over geese shooting at a local beauty spot.
Councillors met yesterday to try and find a way to bring an end to a bitter row over wildfowling at Findhorn Bay.
Conservationists and hunters have been at logger-heads for years with the former wanting an end to shooting at the site.
A voluntary permit system failed to bring a resolution to the conflict with just 23 wildfowlers signing up despite them proposing it in the first place. Many refused to take part in the scheme claiming they had been shut out of the process.
Now councillors have agreed to explore appointing an outside mediator despite the cost, with a view to establishing a new permit scheme.
However, officers have stressed the scheme may fail and could also ultimately force the authority to establish a bye-law, which would cost up to £20,000 in the short-term if it is called in by the Scottish Government, and a further £35,000 in regular review fees.
Forres councillor, and ex-leader, George Alexander said members had no choice but to take action even with the risks involved.
He said: “This is a problem that’s been going for some time and the permit scheme failed to resolve it.
“We could introduce a by-law that could open a whole can of worms because there will almost certainly be opposition to it and it will be challenged.
“The other alternative was to leave the situation as it is but as elected members who receive hundreds of emails and phone calls every shooting season we can’t really bury our heads in the sand.”
Alex Stoddard, director of the Scottish Association for Country Sports (SACS), said the wildfowlers had attempted to be a part of mediation in the past but this had been “derailed”.
He said: “Trust is low and, from our perspective, Moray Council is part of the problem, not the solution. Moray Council and the LNR (local nature reserve) must take full responsibility for the fiasco they have created, and make a genuine effort to bring parties together again. As the reasonable party in discussions and conduct, wildfowlers remain ready to do their part.”
Meanwhile Friends of Findhorn Bay, which has called for a blanket ban on shooting until a long-term compromise can be reached, has accused the council of failing to take forward a legally-binding solution in a by-law.
Lisa Mead of the FFB steering group, said: “What concerns me the most is that since we registered our petition to ban shooting in December 2015, the council has focused its efforts mainly on placating the relatively small number of very vocal shooters, who pursue a totally unnecessary and highly disruptive activity on the bay.”
