Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential implications for his Department's policies of the report entitled Progress in improving the natural environment in England 2022 to 2023 published by the Office for Environmental Protection on 17 January 2024.

This Government is committed to leaving the environment in a better state than we found it. The Office for Environmental Protection’s (OEP) report covers the period 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023. Toward the end of this reporting period, in January 2023, the Government published its revised Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP23) and set its suite of ambitious 13 Environment Act targets. We are now firmly rooted in delivery mode.

Their 200-page report recognises the scale of ambition of EIP23, including our challenging interim targets. The OEP reports some environmental trends are improving, with most progress in reducing air pollutants, greenhouse gases and chemical pollutants.

We will carefully review the OEP’s findings and respond in due course.