Housing secretary Steve Reed has instructed Labour MPs to reject an amendment to the new planning bill that aims to protect British wildlife and habitats. The amendment, passed by a large majority in the House of Lords, would remove protected species such as dormice, badgers, hedgehogs, otters, and nightingales, as well as rare habitats like wetlands and ancient woodlands, from rules allowing developers to bypass environmental laws to accelerate house building.
Under the Labour-proposed draft legislation, developers could pay into a national "nature recovery fund" and proceed immediately with projects, avoiding the requirement for environmental surveys and measures to first avoid, then mitigate damage. Experts have criticised this as a regression on decades-old environmental law, with ecologists and environmental groups labelling it "cash to trash."
The Lords' amendment would restrict the nature recovery fund to impacts from water and air pollution, compelling developers to take standard measures to mitigate harm to wildlife and habitats. Reed has recommended rejecting this amendment when the bill returns to the Commons on Thursday for its final stages before becoming law.
In a letter to MPs, major UK nature charities including the Wildlife Trusts and RSPB stated that the government's rollback of environmental law "lacks any rigorous scientific or ecological justification." The letter added, "There is no credible, published, or well established evidence that this model can simply be scaled or replicated for multiple species nationwide without risking serious ecological harm, legal uncertainty, and increased costs for both developers and land managers."
The Guardian revealed that chancellor Rachel Reeves and housing minister Matthew Pennycook have met scores of developers over the past year regarding the planning bill. Reeves has not met any environmental organisation or the body for professional ecologists, while Pennycook has held only four meetings with such groups compared to 16 with leading developers.
A spokesperson for the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government defended the bill, saying: "The planning and infrastructure bill will remove barriers to building vital new homes and infrastructure and this amendment is an unnecessary limit on the benefits which the nature restoration fund will create for both nature and the economy. There are already safeguards in our legislation to ensure environmental delivery plans are effective for the environment, as we get Britain building again and deliver the homes we need."
