The Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) has today (Friday, 2 May) written to the Government with advice on how its proposed planning reforms can be strengthened to ensure they achieve ‘win win’ outcomes for development and nature.
The OEP’s letter welcomes the Government’s intention for this proposed reform, to secure better outcomes for nature at the same time as accelerating necessary development, and says that much of what the Bill seeks to achieve would be beneficial, if well implemented.
It does identify a number of areas where environmental protections in the Bill should be strengthened.
Dame Glenys Stacey, Chair of the OEP, said: “We recognise Government’s ongoing commitment to nature’s recovery, which will be so vital to meeting the Environment Act’s legally binding targets, the first of which fall due within the next few years. Our latest assessment of Government’s progress found it is largely off track to meet its legal environmental commitments.
“Taking a more strategic approach to addressing environmental challenges such as nutrient overloading, has much to commend it. We wish to see that strategic approach succeed, to deliver co-ordinated action that improves nature at the appropriate geographical scale.
“We are, however, concerned by several aspects of the bill which undermine its potential to deliver the intended win-win outcomes. There are fewer protections for nature written into the bill than under existing law. Creating new flexibility without sufficient legal safeguards could see environmental outcomes lessened over time.
“And aiming to improve environmental outcomes overall, whilst laudable, is not the same as maintaining in law high levels of protection for specific habitats and species.
“In our considered view, the bill would have the effect of reducing the level of environmental protection provided for by existing environmental law. As drafted, the provisions are a regression.
“The situation is not unresolvable. In our advice we set out how the reductions in legal protections for the environment in the proposed approach can be ameliorated in large part. This would make a material difference to the prospects of government achieving more for nature whilst also streamlining and speeding up planning decisions.”
The OEP advice includes strengthening the ‘overall improvement test’ element of the Bill and inclusion of safeguards for the overall network of protected sites.
The advice can be read in full by pressing the blue button on this page.
