Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether it is Network Rail's policy to implement the recommendations of the (a) Varley Review and (b) Network Rail Vegetation Management Review.

Network Rail welcomed John Varley's independent report on its approach to vegetation management and set out how it would respond to the review’s recommendations when it was published.

In its Environmental Sustainability Strategy published in September 2020 Network Rail commits to exceeding the review’s recommendation to achieve no net loss of biodiversity across the network by 2024 and net gain by 2040, instead achieving biodiversity net gain by 2035. Further details will be set out in the forthcoming biodiversity action plan.