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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of the European Commission’s support for grazing and the controlled burning of vegetation as measures to reduce wildfire risk.

Careful choice of land management techniques can play a part in reducing wildfire impacts and bring a wide range of public benefits, but influencing human behaviour will be essential in preventing most wildfires from starting. Decisions on the most appropriate land management technique(s) should be tailored to the site in question, be evidence-led and part of a wider long-term strategy, beyond individual site boundaries, to restore ecosystem health and function.

Caution is needed when interpreting evidence from elsewhere in the world where there may be different fire regimes, habitat and vegetation types, and/or societal and cultural characteristics including current and historic grazing management. Some strategies used in countries with natural fire regimes (e.g. where lightning strikes are a common ignition source for wildfires), where target habitats may be naturally adapted to fire, over thousands of years, may not be appropriate in the UK where most wildfire is caused by humans.