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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the 500,000 hectares of wildlife-rich habitat the Government has committed to creating or restoring is in addition to or inclusive of replacing habitat lost as a result of the National High speed Rail Network.

HS2 is the first major infrastructure project to commit to seeking to deliver no net loss in biodiversity across the route. However, we can still go further and the Government is asking HS2 Ltd to look to identify opportunities to move towards gains in biodiversity, where it is reasonably practicable to do so. HS2 is also enhancing the Phase 2a scheme's existing No Net Loss objective, by working to identify and implement appropriate opportunities, where it is reasonably practicable, to move towards net gains in biodiversity.

We are still developing our monitoring approach for net gain and for wider commitments in the 25 Year Environment Plan such as the Nature Recovery Network, which incorporates the commitment to create or restore 500,000 hectares of wildlife-rich habitat outside protected sites.

We expect mandatory and voluntary net gain to contribute both to the Nature Recovery Network and to the long-term goal. As we develop our monitoring and delivery approaches to net gain and to the Nature Recovery Network more broadly, we will clearly need to consider how much of the habitat created is contributing to the goal.