Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Victoria Collins Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Bailey (Reading West and Mid Berkshire) (Lab)]

I am pleased to support this important Bill and the Government amendments to it, which will deliver the housing, infrastructure and environmental protections that my constituents need.

First, I welcome the Government’s enhancements to the environmental delivery plan. They provide greater clarity, legal safeguards and appropriate flexibility to ensure that the plan restores and enhances our precious natural habitats. The current piecemeal approach to offsetting environmental harm is not working. The Government’s sensible approach maintains existing protections for nature, and adds to them with the ability to fund high-impact strategic nature recovery projects. I am very lucky that there are several significant nature recovery projects in my constituency, such as Sulham woods and meadows, which I had the pleasure of visiting last week. This project is maximising biodiversity on 130 hectares of marginal arable land, and is planting 24,000 trees, 4 km of new hedgerow and a new walnut orchard. We need more big projects like this.

I would like to highlight the opportunity the Bill presents for our country’s chalk streams. I am proud to represent a constituency that boasts many wonderful waterways, including the entire length of the River Pang—a beautiful, winding chalk stream that is a point of local pride. It is said to be the inspiration for the “Wind in the Willows”, and it is loved by families, dog walkers and anglers alike. But the precious Pang is in crisis. In just a few short years, the water quality has plummeted to poor. Citizen scientists and anglers testing the river, such as Professor Mike Wilson and Pete Devery, consistently report samples with completely unacceptable levels of phosphate and E. coli. The phosphate pollution from Thames Water sewage works is so bad that luminous green from the resultant algae can be seen in satellite images.

I thank all the campaigners, citizen scientists and volunteers with whom I have been working throughout my campaign to restore the Pang. I also thank the ARC project, the Rivers Trust, the Angling Trust, Pang Valley Flood Forum and Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust, as well as all members of the Pang Flagship Chalk Stream Partnership, which supports a range of initiatives to restore the Pang. They are all dedicated advocates whose restoration efforts are making a real difference. Chalk streams are rare and valuable habitats. Their mineral-rich, stable waters are home to a plethora of species.

[Victoria Collins (Harpenden and Berkhamsted) (LD)]

The hon. Member is talking about chalk streams, which are the rainforests of the UK. A chalk stream in my constituency has had over 4,000 hours of non-stop sewage, and it sounds like the River Pang has been a victim of something similar. Amendment 16 is so important to protect our chalk streams, and local people say to me, as development comes, that this is actually groundwater. Would she support amendment 16?

[Olivia Bailey]

I thank the hon. Member for her contribution. I will come to my view on that amendment.

Given that 85% of the world’s chalk streams are in England, it is right that we consider chalk streams England’s rainforests. We have a duty, as their custodians, to protect them for future generations. While some chalk streams have protections, such as site of special scientific interest status, many, including the Pang, lack even that. The Bill, alongside our landmark water legislation, is an opportunity to expand the protections for chalk streams. I am grateful for the conversations I have had with the Minister on this issue, and I know how committed he is to our chalk streams, so I ask if he will commit to strengthening the protections for our chalk streams as this Bill progresses.

The Bill is an opportunity to build the homes and infrastructure that this country needs, boost our economy, and protect precious habitats like the Pang. I look forward to continuing to support it.