RSPB blames ‘liars’ social media post on junior staff

The Charity Commission has found that a social media post by the RSPB, which referred to Rishi Sunak and others as “liars”, was “inappropriate”. 

Last year, the RSPB released posts on X (previously Twitter), featuring the former prime minister, Michael Gove and Thérèse Coffey above the word “LIARS!”. The caption said: “You lie, and you lie, and you lie again. And we’ve had enough.” 

The post was published in August 2023, in response to the then Government’s move to lift anti-pollution restrictions on house building. RSPB briefed the media that “an overzealous junior staff member” had gone rogue while bosses were on holiday. 

The Charity Commission said the “tone and nature of the RSPB’s post was inappropriate and had not been signed off at the appropriate level within the charity”. But it did not impose any sanctions. 

Countryside Alliance director of external affairs, Mo Metcalf-Fisher, told ST: “That the offending post was ‘inappropriate’ is obvious, the real elephant in the room is the fact that the RSPB has done very little publicly to condemn its working partner, United Utilities, one of the worst polluting water firms. Continued silence leaves them open to the accusation of hypocrisy.”