Editorial: Justice for a much-loved sycamore tree, felled by vandals

​Two thugs have been convicted of cutting down a sycamore tree in the north of England. We report their case on page 12.

The Sycamore Gap tree stood beautifully on Hadrian’s wall. It was cut up and removed from the site by Daniel Graham, 39 and Adam Carruthers, 32, both from Cumbria.

Jurors took five hours to reach unanimous verdicts against them after a nine day trial in Newcastle upon Tyne.

It sounds harsh or maybe even populist to say that they must now be jailed (sentencing is in July).

But it needs to happen for a number of key reasons.

First, an uplifting aspect of the saga is the way in which it outraged an entire nation.

It was an act of aesthetic and environmental vandalism against a 150-year-old tree at a time when there seems to be much vandalism. Fine old buildings are dishonestly burnt down to avoid the cost of restoring them. Wonderful trees are often felled for dubious reasons, and even when in Northern Ireland they have tree protection orders the fines are lamentably inadequate. A developer can just pay it as a cost.

In the case fine old buildings, they are never replaced – modern buildings are almost never built to the same standard, no matter how expensive.

And fine old trees take more than a century to be replaced by something comparable.

Some of the most wonderful trees on these islands are in fact hundreds of years old.

This case has sent a messages to vandals everywhere not to hack done much loved all trees.

This sycamore tree was on National Trust land and widely photograph and appreciated.

Yet in an instant it was destroyed. It cannot be replaced to the same standard. But there has, thank goodness, been justice against the culprits.