Sites of Special Scientific Interest (Designation)

1st reading
Wednesday 13th March 2024 Commons Chamber

Motion for leave to bring in a Bill (Standing Order No. 23)

13:57

[Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to transfer the power to designate sites of special scientific interest from Natural England to the Secretary of State; to make provision about the exercise of that power by the Secretary of State; and for connected purposes.

I am conscious that I stand in the way of legislation that will provide a tax cut for 29 million people, so I will not detain the House for long.

Sites of special scientific interest are the most precious natural landscapes in this country, and they are vital to our biodiversity. Their importance has long been recognised—long before the word “biodiversity” was coined. For 75 years, additional protection has been given to areas that are of special interest by reason of their flora, fauna or geological or physiographical features.

The current system of notification was put in place by the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. That law, as amended, gave the decision to designate an area as an SSSI to Natural England, and Natural England exists

“to ensure that the natural environment is conserved, enhanced, and managed for the benefit of present and future generations”.

That important aim is now at the heart of Government decision making. In fact, the Environment Act 2021 goes further and says that the Government as a whole must have regard to environmental principles; not just conserving or even just enhancing the natural environment, but actually restoring nature. That being so, there is no longer any reason for decisions about the notification of SSSIs to be outsourced. No protections would be lost if this power were transferred to the Secretary of State, which is why I am bringing in this Bill.

I hope that Ministers will note that the Bill is supported by a former Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, two former DEFRA Ministers, the Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee, the Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, and several other MPs who have demonstrated their support for and understanding of our natural environment, and how that can be enhanced in harmony with producing the food the nation needs.

Should the Government adopt the Bill—and I hope they do—there will still be a place for Natural England in identifying sites for designation and collating the data and scientific evidence, but it would be for the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to interrogate this evidence and decide whether Natural England is correct in its assessment.

At the moment, Natural England is marking its own homework, and the experience of farmers in my constituency is that it could do better. Last year, 3,044 hectares of West Penwith were confirmed as a site of special scientific interest. It was no surprise that Penwith moors and downs were identified as a candidate for notification. It is the most beautiful part of the world—I happen to live right on the edge—with unique heathland that provides a habitat for many rare species, including birds such as the Dartford warbler, which has a breeding population; invertebrates such as the rare Perkin’s mining bee and the tormentil nomad bee; and vascular plants such as the coral necklace.

It is also a man-made landscape, with a long history of agriculture and livestock grazing, with many of the 4,000-year-old field systems still being used for their original purpose. The farmers on the land know that the richness of Penwith moors is the result of their careful management of the land for many years, over multiple generations, and so they were shocked by the high-handed way in which Natural England approached the designation.

In October 2022, SSSI notification packs landed on the doormats of landowners and farmers, and, contrary to our expectation, close to 1,000 acres of clean land—pastures, paddocks and land on which crops or even animal feed could be grown—were included. The notification documents did not include clear evidence or reasons why their clean land had been included. It became very clear that Natural England’s case relied on scientific evidence that was not much more than desktop studies and old survey data.

To take an example, after Natural England’s hearing last year, which I attended, its experts admitted that they did not have evidence to include the 700-plus acres of good pasture farmland—by this time, more than 200 acres had been successfully challenged by landowners and removed from the SSSI—and that the only reason for including clean land was “the potential for pollution”. Probably even less clean land would have been included had all landowners had the funds to mount a legal challenge.

The theory was that excess nitrate in surface water would reach the valley mires to the detriment of the special flora and fauna. This was highlighted by Farmscoper, a free desktop tool that offers generic assessment, but with the disclaimer that its results should be checked by on-site testing. That testing was not carried out prior to notification and, as far as I am aware, the checks are yet to be carried out. Likewise, bird surveys were undertaken for a year, not the three to five years specified by Natural England’s own guidance, and invertebrate surveys relied on a single year, rather than the three years that it should have been.

Natural England could have easily engaged constructively with farmers and landowners to establish a more robust scientific case for designating accurately any area that justifies such a significant level of protection—it did not. Even at the public hearing in June last year, the chair of Natural England, its legal team and senior officials refused to accept responsibility or ownership of these failures, and pressed ahead with notification. It is not accountable to the farmers, to members of the Government or to Members of this House.

Why does this matter? Because now, following confirmation of the SSSI, farmers are subject to the same Natural England staff dictating how they operate their farms. That includes their demanding that farmers apply for consent to milk cows or keep livestock. There is the risk that farming businesses will become unsustainable, which will impact on the rural economy and food security, while no meaningful benefit to the environment is delivered. Farmers are already selling their businesses.

I will give just one example of a farm in my constituency. This farm has two fields with a mixture of acid pasture, ferns and heather, and grassland, which Natural England included in the SSSI with the rest of the farmland and which is already in Natural England’s higher level stewardship scheme. The farmers objected to the inclusion of the two fields, which were used for winter feeding of yearling Red Ruby Devon heifers. As far as Natural England was concerned, there was no boundary between the rough land and the main grass pasture, and so all of it was in the SSSI and hence under restriction.

The farm naturally decided not to squander money on a fence, but to reduce stocking levels. What is shocking is not just that the farm is losing out from unjustifiable restrictions—I shall talk about the economic benefits later—but that these restrictions will do the reverse of what is intended. Reduced grazing on the moorland will make way for invasive species such as brambles and rhododendrons to take over, and this will actually reduce biodiversity, unless the state is prepared to spend large sums of money on eradication.

My Bill would allow the Environment Secretary to interrogate the science and scrutinise Natural England’s decisions. My experience from engaging with the Department is that it fully understands the concerns that I have raised, including on the viability of farms if good farming land is included without assessing its risk to the rough land. It is Natural England that seems to have ridden roughshod over farmers’ countryside management and their understanding of how to care for their natural environment. This is not the only part of England where serious tensions exist between Natural England and organisations and individuals who have devoted their lives to the careful stewardship of the countryside.

My Bill would also give the Secretary of State the power to consider other factors in designation—factors that Natural England cannot consider. Last year, I spoke in an Adjournment debate about the way in which Natural England did not consider—and could not consider—the social, cultural and economic implications of notification. As I have stated, Natural England was not concerned with the viability of the farms, and it was not concerned with the rural properties off the grid for which boreholes are the only source of water. Boreholes in SSSIs can only be used with Natural England’s consent.

The Minister’s predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison), agreed with me, saying:

“It is high time that we looked at how those protections impact the economy and the social and cultural side of farming, and we will be doing just that. If we are to truly halt the decline of nature, we need our farmers to do all they can for environmental stewardship.”—[Official Report, 18 September 2023; Vol. 737, c. 1211.]

It is indeed high time, and my Bill would give the Environment Secretary the power to do so. If our farmers are to do all they can for environmental stewardship, they need a Department that will support them. They need a Department that is responsible for SSSIs and the funding to support landscape recovery, and a Department that can strike harmony between the public goods of conservation and food production, and the need to ensure that farms are viable and that the rural economy thrives. The notification of a SSSI impacts on the environment, food and rural affairs; it should therefore be the responsibility of DEFRA to make that decision.

Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,

That Derek Thomas, Dr Thérèse Coffey, Trudy Harrison, Philip Dunne, Sir Robert Goodwill, Steve Double, Selaine Saxby, Sir Bill Wiggin, Greg Smith, Simon Jupp, Maggie Throup and Mark Menzies present the Bill.

Derek Thomas accordingly presented the Bill.

Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 26 April, and to be printed (Bill 180).

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