Environmental Protection and Biodiversity
Debate between Mary Creagh and Ellie Chowns(1 day, 16 hours ago)
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Mary Creagh
I will not give way, as I want to respond to some of the points that hon. Members made.
The hon. Member for Horsham (John Milne) mentioned biodiversity net gain, which became mandatory in February 2024. There is emerging evidence that it is working as intended, and we will publish our response to our consultation on that shortly. Developers are seeking ecological advice earlier in the planning process so that they do not waste money trying to build on precious sites, and they are seeking to avoid biodiversity impacts when choosing between sites.
The shadow Minister talked about local nature recovery strategies, as did the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). The hard work of local authorities to finalise and publish those strategies is bearing fruit. When we came into office, those authorities were not really sure what the strategies were for, so we had to provide a lot of guidance and work with local councils and regional combined authorities to publish 28 of the 48 strategies, with the remainder fast approaching completion. Those strategies will be a new tool in driving action on the ground, and helping partnerships in the public, private and voluntary sectors to work together to focus collective efforts on where they will achieve the most.
We will also go further and faster on protected landscapes. My hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Joe Morris) and I saw kids from Newcastle who were out for their first ever walk in his gorgeous Northumberland national park. Making sure that our green spaces are greener, wilder and more accessible is crucial to what we want to do. On species recovery, my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Anna Gelderd) talked about the red-billed chough and the tough little Cornish black bee. Bees’ Needs Week is coming up soon, and I urge everyone to go to the website and get their local organisations involved. Kew at Wakehurst will host the prizegiving this year, and I encourage local groups to get involved.
Since the early 90s, we have prevented 35 national extinctions through the species recovery programme and supported 1,000 species, such as the fen orchid, the large blue butterfly and the red-billed chough. We are committed to funding that programme—there is a new round of funding until 2029. More than 200 projects have applied, and we will announce the successful ones in May. We talked about beavers, and I was thrilled to visit the National Trust’s Holnicote estate in Somerset for the release of a mother beaver and her two kits last month, which was one of two wild releases in south-west England this year. Beavers bring many benefits: creating havens for other wildlife, improving water quality and reducing the impact of flood and droughts. That is part of our mission to protect and restore nature.
On landscape recovery, the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) talked about the vital role of farmers and land managers in creating wildlife-rich environments. The plans for landscape recovery are backed by a down payment of £500 million over the course of this Parliament, which is the lifetime cost for the first tranche of projects coming through in round one. We expect future tranches to be delivered with further funding allocations. That part of the largest nature-friendly farming budget in history goes alongside significant funding for further nature-friendly farming schemes.
We heard from the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) that, last year, tree planting in England reached its highest level in over 20 years, but our woodland cover is still too low. We are committed to meet the Environment Act target to increase woodland cover to 16.5% by 2050, and the new national forest in the Ox-Cam arc is going to make his constituents closer to nature. That shows that we can build beautiful housing, a new railway line and new nature alongside each other.
This year, we will publish a new trees action plan for England, outlining how we will meet our Environment Act target and improve the resilience and conditions of trees and woodlands nationwide. We have £1 billion for tree planting and forestry sector support over this Parliament, which is the largest investment in nature in our history.
My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North (Martin Rhodes) raised the issue of our overseas impacts and the 30 by 30 work. Our overseas territories hold over 90% of the UK’s unique species. We reaffirmed our joint ambition with the territories to protect their ecosystems and launched the first ever co-created overseas territories biodiversity strategy with every territory Government. We have funded 43 new Darwin Plus projects worth over £7.9 million. Nature-based solutions include Saint Helena’s cloud forest, which is providing clean drinking water, the British Virgin Islands mangroves and the Falklands Islands peatlands.
We have heard about salt marshes and seagrass, and they are incredible buffers against the increasingly intense storms that are buffeting our ocean. Our ocean is also under threat from acidification and heating, and that is why we are driving to protect marine ecosystems and working for a global plastic pollution treaty. A new chair has been elected for that process, and we look forward to making further progress.
We have committed £14 million to eight projects in our ocean grant scheme to support locally led solutions to protect the ocean and the communities who depend on it. In Mozambique, for example, that is supporting local partners to establish a corridor of 20 locally managed marine areas.
I am not the Minister for chalk streams, but I want to address them very quickly and say to the hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) that we will be delivering more than 1,000 targeted actions for chalk stream restoration. I will take his message back to the water Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy). On the national policy planning framework, the consultation is still live, and I think we are looking in that consultation to put chalk streams as features of high environmental value into planning policy.
We welcome and support the ambition of the curlew action plan. There are many such plans across many of our protected landscapes. I am happy to get the water Minister to meet the hon. Member for Winchester (Dr Chambers). On soils, we have committed to bringing 40% of our agricultural soil into sustainable management by 2028 and increasing that to 60% by 2030. Soil is the foundation of our food system, but also an important part of our climate system. That will be achieved via our environmental management schemes—