Response to the Prime Minister’s Green Recovery Speech
CIEEM (Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management) is extremely disappointed to hear the Prime Minister’s words at Dudley this [Tuesday] morning. Despite heralding a green recovery and promising investment into a green future, the Prime Minister sent mixed messages by belittling the importance of biodiversity through his attribution of the slow rate of housebuilding in the UK to “newt counting delays”.
Firstly, CIEEM is not aware of the existence of any robust data demonstrating that the presence of great crested newts slows down development. Responsible developers, who carry out appropriate surveys early in the planning stages, would not normally experience a delay significant enough to affect their rate of housing completions. However, if a proportion of developers did experience such delays, the effect would surely be one of deferment, not cancellation of projects. Since laws protecting great crested newts in the UK have been in place since 1981, it seems highly unlikely that delayed projects with great crested newt issues would be to blame for the 2018 housing figures cited by the Prime Minister.
It is interesting to note that the PM’s comparators, Germany, the Netherlands and France, as member states of the EU, all implement the same EU directives on protection of rare species, and all fall within the natural range of the great crested newt. The only legitimate conclusions regarding their differing rates of house construction would seem to be that either (i) there is nothing wrong with the EU law protecting great crested newts, just the way that the UK government has chosen to implement it, or (ii) that the differences in housing completions are, in fact, nothing to do with newts and relate to more traditional issues like land supply, the wider planning regime and interest rates. The 2018 Letwin Review found no fault with environmental regulations, but rather in the variety of developments offered.
We understand that it is tempting to blame the great crested newt for policy and market failures, but we would caution that failure to recognise the importance of biodiversity to humanity is a grave error. Our greatest concern is that this is not merely a soundbite, but an indication of policy direction; a ‘Green Recovery’, but only when convenient?
The Government must act in line with its own stated policy in the 25-Year Environment Plan; that every aspect of our society, including the housing market, is reliant on goods and services provided, freely, by the natural environment. Biodiversity is also critical to our ability to adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change and, as a nation, we need to invest in nature-based solutions. These ‘ecosystem services’ (food, fuel, timber, air, water, minerals and many more) support enterprise to a far greater degree than any Covid recovery package, and business continuity is at risk if we do not understand, evaluate, protect and enhance these aspects of the natural environment on which we rely. Great crested newts are not the problem, they are part of the solution.
The Prime Minister is right in that this is a “chance to be radical”. It must not be a return to business as usual. We have the opportunity to truly move to a green economy that values and enhances the natural environment and places nature-based solutions at its heart. In order to do so he should be focusing on the importance of creating green jobs to support both economic recovery and tackling the climate emergency and biodiversity crisis. Up-skilling the UK workforce and creating green employment will help us to deliver better development and better outcomes for society.
We ask the Prime Minister and his government to stop blaming nature for policy failures of the past and to start helping nature provide the solutions we need for a better future.
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Well the press release was robust but did not take the opportunity to land the punch it needed to.
Boris may be a clown but he’s not an idiot. By framing the housing problem as one of “newt counting” he’s trivialising environmental regulations and setting them up to be discounted at a later date for the greater good of the country.
Despite all the government greenwashing with environmental jobs the other NGOs should take not and start to lay down their battle plans.
First, they came for the newts and I did not speak out…
Quite. This is the problem with the Twenty Five year plan. The present incumbent can just kick it down the road to the next one. And we don’t have 25 years anyway.
And that Newt line?, pure Trump.
Your right Stuart, he’s not an idiot, he knows exactly what he is doing.
CIEEM have not always been as pro-active as they might have been, but this rapid response to the nonsense spouted by Johnson in Tuesday’s speech is excellent and deserves due praise and credit.
Indeed, but a skeptic might be forgiven for pondering that if they don’t speak out their newt counting members lose trade;) But yes, indeed and so gone up a notch in my estimation:) Let’s see how many CIEEM members read this and dislike, thus creating interesting data?
All NGOs should be speaking out but their Boards will be reluctant to rock any potential funding crumbs from tables;(
Thank goodness for the likes of Wild Justice and people who will take on the statutory stupidity:)
That said we all of us need to keep on pounding the keyboards to ministers, our MPs & media &c. – ha, MSM not too interested in protecting wildlife?
Caroline Lucas on the small bit of the ‘Today’ programme I could face before getting up this morning spoke a lot of sense (of course) in response to the Johnson comment and on practical ways we could improve our housing, energy use, etc…..
and then I got up and put the world service back on for a more global perspective on the news
“Dominic Cummings has pledged to overhaul Britain’s ‘appalling’ planning system during the coronavirus recovery…” Daily Telegraph 23 June, reprinted in the current Private Eye. Hold on to your hats!
I dont think there is a mixed message at all, they intend to “come after” environmental regulation. Its one of their brexit bonuses.