Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Pow Excerpts

Thursday 9th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

3. What steps his Department is taking to help increase tree planting.

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

This Government have put in place the most comprehensive regime ever to increase tree planting. Crucially, it is underpinned by legislation in the Environment Act 2021 and legally binding targets to increase our tree cover to 16.5%, and supported and backed up by our £675 million nature for climate fund. To date, 15 million trees have been planted under this Government, more trees than in any other decade.

[Theresa Villiers]

Trees must play a crucial role if we are to meet our commitments on nature recovery and net zero, and they are a tremendous source of happiness, well-being and landscape beauty. To meet the ambitious tree-planting goals that the Government have set, can they streamline the permissions process? Some of the red tape seems disproportionate and in need of regulatory reform.

[Rebecca Pow]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the work she has done in her constituency to encourage tree planting, but she is right that the process needs to be fast and simple. We have taken that on board, and the Forestry Commission has recently introduced the woodland creation fast track, aiming to help to decide eligible woodland creation offers within just 12 weeks. To inform that scheme, it has developed a low-sensitivity map of the whole country to show people the best places to plant trees, or where they could think about planting trees, that are not on our best available agricultural land, which is important for food.

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

Led by the Woodland Trust, Tree Equity Score UK is a map-based application created to address disparities in urban tree distribution by identifying the areas in greatest need of investment in trees. What is the Department doing to promote increased tree cover in the parts of the country that need it most?

[Rebecca Pow]

I highlight again the low-sensitivity map, which points out exactly the same things as the map the hon. Gentleman refers to. We have many funds focused in particular on urban areas—some come from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities —to encourage urban tree planting, because it is so important for our health and wellbeing. We have a whole list of funds available, and I urge people to look at them and plant trees.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I have to say that the Minister’s response suggests that the Government are completely in denial. The Office for Environmental Protection report exposed that the Government are way off target on their legally binding tree-planting target. There has been no trend of improvement on tree planting between 2018 and 2023. It would be bad enough if the problem were lack of money, but her Department is even failing to spend the money that it has been allocated. The environmental land management scheme is underspent by hundreds of millions, and the nature for climate fund that she spoke about has returned £77 million to the Treasury unspent. Is not it clear that, to get the tree cover that our country needs, we do not need a magic money tree; we need a Labour Government?

[Rebecca Pow]

I ask the hon. Gentleman to look at his own tree-planting record. This Government have planted more trees than Labour did. We now have the plan in place so, if one looks at the graph, it is ramping up to hit those targets, and the training, skills, the forest apprenticeship and the framework are in place to reach our targets.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

4. What steps his Department is taking to strengthen coastal defences.

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[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

10. What steps his Department is taking to help improve animal welfare.

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

This Government remain absolutely committed to implementing our action plan for animal welfare. Since the action plan was published in 2021, we have made significant progress on a whole raft of animal welfare measures, such as introducing tougher sentences on animal cruelty and new laws on animal sentience, bringing forward legislation to ban live exports and keeping primates as pets, launching the animal health and welfare pathway, ensuring the microchipping of cats, and backing critical legislation to crack down on puppy smuggling, pet abduction and livestock worrying.

[Henry Smith]

I am grateful for that answer and, indeed, for all the animal welfare measures that this Government have introduced. Recently, pupils in Larch class at Three Bridges Primary School wrote to me very eloquently about their concern for the welfare and protection of endangered species. Can the Minister say a little more about what her Department is doing in that respect?

[Rebecca Pow]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question, and indeed for his own work on animal welfare in this place, which has been impressive. I also thank the pupils of Larch class at Three Bridges Primary School. He can go back and tell them that this Government are absolutely committed to tackling this and to helping endangered species. We are actually the first Government to legislate to halt species decline in this country—as far as I know, no other country has done that anywhere in the world—and we have funds to save species. They might also like to hear about otters returning to our rivers, about saving red kites by protecting them from persecution, about saving the chalk hill blue butterfly and more.

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[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Ind)]

North West Leicestershire has benefited enormously from being the heart of the national forest, with millions of trees planted over the past 40 years, much of which are on degraded former colliery land. As desirable as tree planting is, that must be balanced against food security. Does the Minister agree that good agricultural land must be protected to produce good food?

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

I must first commend the national forest for all that it has achieved. Many farmers are involved in that forest, too. That is why the Forestry Commission’s map showing the best places for tree planting is so important, and that is not on what we call best available land, for which we have specified that the main priority is food production.

The Attorney General was asked—