National Tree Strategy

Rebecca Pow Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2020 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Rebecca Pow)]

It is an absolute pleasure to be having this debate with you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. What a veritable forest of parliamentary tree-huggers and lovers we have in the room! We have so much in common when we talk about trees. I like to argue with the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard), but that is quite difficult on this subject, although I will try on a couple of points.

Of course, I have to thank the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) for securing this debate about tree planting and the all-encompassing things that trees bring to us and to our lives. Planting more trees in England and protecting our existing woodlands are a key part of the Government’s plan to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

I said that I was not going to get feisty, but I will get this off my chest. We do not just talk about tree planting numbers. We have the national forest inventory, which looks at all tree planting and forestation, so it is not right to say that we talk only about the numbers of trees. Just as important to us is protecting the standing trees. This is not just about individual tree planting numbers.

I absolutely agree with the shadow Minister on the importance of planting the right tree in the right place and how we can do much more to sequester carbon and deliver all the multiple benefits that trees provide us with. That is why the Government’s ambitious “Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution” clearly sets out our commitment to plant 30,000 hectares of trees every year in the UK by 2025, protecting and restoring our natural environment, but also creating jobs. A number of hon. Members, especially Opposition Members, suggested that we are not being ambitious. I say that this plan absolutely demonstrates our ambition. This is not just a game of numbers and writing random numbers on the board; we are setting out the process and methods by which we will actually be able to plant the trees. That is the key thing, because it is not straightforward. We have to harness the good will of all the landowners in this country and all the other people involved. As the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) said, there are various big land owners, including the Church and the Ministry of Defence. Those are all important.

I think that we do have the ambition. We are committed to what I would say is a step change in how we work, and we are working closely with devolved Administrations, which is really important as well. Yes, Scotland is planting a great many trees, but it has different terrain, so people are not always comparing like with like. We have to work together on this.

We are exploring whether a statutory target for trees in England would be appropriate under the target-setting process that we have set out in the Environment Bill, which has just been through Committee. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport will know, if he has listened to the Committee’s proceedings, what that process is and what it will enable. We can set a target on anything we think is the right thing to do for the environment. Certainly, we can explore whether we need targets for trees, which is tremendously exciting, because we have not had that opportunity before—that is why the Environment Bill is so great. I applaud Northern Ireland and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on the new target that has been announced for how many trees will be planted in Northern Ireland, which is to be welcomed.

We welcome the advice of the Committee on Climate Change and we will carefully consider its recommendations as we set out our sixth carbon budget. Our nature for climate fund will invest £640 million in driving up nature-based solutions, including supporting our ambitious tree planting programme. It will be underpinned by the imminent and much talked about England tree strategy, which will be published in spring, as has been referenced.

Today’s debate is timely because Lord Goldsmith, the Minister responsible for trees, with whom I work closely because trees obviously have an impact on everything to do with the environment, is hosting a roundtable right now to discuss the strategy’s development. A great deal of work continues on that.

We have an opportunity, as the hon. Member for Barnsley Central rightly said, to harness this moment and have an exciting new way of thinking about trees. Over the summer, we consulted on the England tree strategy. We received more than 20,000 responses, which reflects the interest in this area and the importance placed on trees. I thank every single body and organisation that contributed to that consultation. We have a vision that will set out what we want England’s treescape to look like for future generations and how we deliver the goal set out in our 25-year environment plan.

As many hon. Members have said, trees and woodlands can deliver multiple benefits, not least for nature and biodiversity. We have heard so much about biodiversity, not least from our cirl bunting champion, my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Anthony Mangnall). Cirl buntings actually live in the more arable lands that we get around the coast, but that is not say that we cannot talk about them in a tree debate, because it is all about biodiversity. We need well-designed new woodlands, supported by long-term management, to help nature’s recovery.

Through our new environmental land management scheme, landowners and managers will be able to integrate trees into the landscape, which will contribute to the nature recovery networks for which there are many measures of support in the Environment Bill, and be able to support the Government’s commitment—another big Government commitment—to 30% of our land being protected by 2030.

On top of our future schemes, I encourage any farmer or landowner considering tree planting to sign up to the countryside stewardship grants now, if they have not done so already, or to extend their schemes, because those will enable them to transition to the new environmental land management scheme if they choose to in future. We already have a range of grants to encourage woodland planting, but we will be opening new grants for woodland creation in spring, with money from the nature for climate fund, which is designed to do just that.

Trees and woodlands can deliver for water and soil. We know, for example, that trees can make an important contribution to natural flood management, as we have heard from several hon. Members, particularly the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell). We have supported that through £5.7 million of funding in the Northern forest. Linked to that, £700,000 has been allocated to Leeds City Council for its flood alleviation scheme to help to prevent future flooding incidents in Leeds through the creation of woodlands higher up the steep-sided valleys known as cloughs. That is exactly what many hon. Members have been suggesting. Work is under way, and hopefully we will see a great deal more of it.

We are also exploring opportunities to support tree planting and woodland creation along rivers, to create riparian woodlands. We hope that the beavers will not come and gnaw them all down—beavers are very useful in one way, but not when it comes to that. It is a carefully controlled management tool that we have to work into all our processes of thinking. Woody buffer strips along waterways can be helpful in many ways.

Lord Goldsmith and I have been engaging with a number of experts and specialists who have illustrated the variety of that kind of planting, which can help our aquatic environment, mitigate flooding, and help us meet our net-zero targets. The Environment Agency has already been awarded £1.4 million from the nature for climate fund to support projects that will plant more than 850,000 trees and protect and enhance 162 km of river.

We know that tree planting is not suitable for all locations, so we will work to ensure that the vision showcases how we can deliver tree planting that is sensitive to protected landscapes and complements our heritage. We obviously need to ensure they work in harmony with habitats such as our peat lands and the uplands, and we will link up with the peat strategy to ensure that we have the trees in the right place.

A number of Members mentioned management issues with trees. Managing pests, deer and grey squirrels is obviously important if we want to maintain trees and biodiversity, as is managing outbreaks of disease, such as the devastating ash dieback, which has been mentioned. I went up to the Quantocks near me the other day, and I nearly cried; it was so devastating. I took photographs—I am always sending them to my team—of how devastating that disease is and what an impact it is going to have. The Government have already set up a nursery that is growing saplings that might be resistant. A lot of work is going on at pace to make sure we can address this, because it is so important.

The hon. Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) mentioned the horticultural nursery industry, and I think he will welcome the fact that, back in the summer, we announced a £2 million partnership of investment to work up domestic nursery capacity to provide the trees that we will need. That is obviously really important.

This is not just about woodlands, though; it is also about hedgerows and shelter belts. We have already taken some actions: we have allocated £2.5 million from the shared outcomes fund to encourage tree planting outside woodlands, and we have announced that we are introducing guidance for local authorities to do their own tree and woodland strategies. I was really interested to hear about Barnsley Council’s tree strategy. Lots of local authorities are working in that way, and it is great to be proactive. They know their areas and where they would like to have the trees.

Trees on farms are also really important. I grew up on a farm and have planted many trees, as has my dad; he has owl boxes and bird boxes all over the place. Those trees are now little woods, so that shows that if we get on with it, it is worth it. I hope the hon. Member for Bristol East will welcome the fact that we have just released guidance on how agroforestry, which integrates trees into the farm landscape, as she eloquently outlined, can be eligible for the basic payment scheme. I agree that could make a really big contribution to our landscapes.

Many hon. Members mentioned urban trees, not least my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson)—I congratulate him on his success with his ten-minute rule Bill. The Government listened, so what a great start. Sit down now—excellent work! I also have to congratulate him on his Latin pronunciation. He made so many good points. Urban trees are so important and will play a part, as will community, forest and parkland trees, which have multiple benefits. We have spent £10 million on the urban tree challenge fund, which has planted just over 18,000 trees across towns and cities to date. We will be continuing with that funding.

On top of that, we are supporting urban tree planting through the green recovery challenge fund. My hon. Friend the Member for Totnes mentioned the planting of 145,000 trees over 88 sites—I think a lot of that came from funding—and I congratulate him on that. That is the model that others should follow, so I hope they keep up the great work.

On the green recovery challenge fund, Earthwatch has recently received funding to plant tiny forests the size of tennis courts. I am a tennis player and I still want some tennis courts, but that is a great idea. Earthwatch has just got an allocation from the new fund that the Government launched, and that will also help with jobs in that world. The forests will connect our communities to trees.

I want to touch on the net gain point that was raised. Developers will be responsible for maintaining the new woodlands that they create through the net gain process. Under the Environment Bill, every developer will have to put back 10% more nature than was there when it started and will have to look after it for 30 years.

The pandemic has highlighted more than ever the importance of nature to our health and wellbeing; many people in this Chamber have touched on that today. That, too, is recognised in our vision for trees, particularly through the community woodlands and the urban and peri-urban planting. As I have set out, we are supporting the existing Northern forest partnership of the community forest and the Woodland Trust. It is a brilliant partnership. The investment is funding the planting of at least 1.8 million new trees across the Northern forest. I applaud the hon. Member for Barnsley Central for being there at the start and then at the millionth tree. The Government are utterly committed to the project.

Hot on the heels of the Northern forest comes the new Northumberland forestry partnership, which will facilitate tree planting in Northumberland. I hope that will help to address the need for more trees in the north. We are doing that at pace. The new nature for climate fund announced £12 million for community forests. The new trees for climate programme will see more than 500 hectares of trees planted in 10 community forests across the country within the next so many months, so that is moving at pace.

Who will plant these new trees? We will need to inspire a generation of foresters. [Interruption.] The Chair is indicating that I need to wind up, so I will do so by answering a couple of questions. I thank the hon. Member for Barnsley Central for his letter to the Secretary of State; he will receive a reply. On the nine shovel-ready projects, I urge him to look at the £200 million innovation fund that opens in January, so will he please apply? Obviously, we will work with all those people to bring all that forward.

Ancient woodlands are hugely important to us, so we have given them extra protection. I had a great visit the other day in Fingle Woods, Dartmoor, where we have provided another fund to help manage that woodland and bring forward new skills to train foresters and sawmill owners, and to provide portable sawmills. There are all kinds of new opportunities in timber. Yes, we need to grow more at home, and yes, we need to use more at home.

I shall wind up, Mr Hollobone, because I know you want me to. I thank the hon. Member for Barnsley Central for securing this debate. There is a huge amount of synergy in the room. We are totally committed to our tree strategy. I am going home this weekend to plant an amelanchier—a beautiful garden tree that Lord Goldsmith gave me for my birthday. I am going to start this weekend, and I urge every Member to do the same, including the Chair. I look forward to working with the hon. Member for Barnsley Central as a champion of COP26. I am sure there is a lot more that we will be able to discuss.