Making Polluters Pay: The Nature 2030 Campaign

The Lawson report in 2010 was a wake-up call. An independent review of wildlife sites by Sir John Lawson left one phrase lingering almost a decade later: “bigger, better, more joined up”. The report investigated the question of whether England’s current wildlife sites are capable of adapting to the growing challenges of climate change and other demands on our land. The answer was a stark "no". We need larger wildlife sites, less isolated from each other and in better condition to reverse the decline of some of our characteristic species and create more resilient landscapes. And that’s why this is incorporated as part of our Wilder Kent strategy.

But without proper regulation enforcing these changes of habit in our industries, today’s climate heroes and heroines are largely part of a voluntary market. The many charities, businesses, developers, landowners and farmers who want to create a “nature-positive” economy and the many investors ready to put in the green finance are the pioneers calling for change, but they alone cannot tip the scales. In fact the environment watchdog suspects that the government have broken their own laws!

Biodiversity Net Gain

While Biodiversity net gain (BNG) enforces the principles that developments leave biodiversity in a better state than before but, it only asks for a minimum 10% gain in biodiversity and only focuses on the development sector. 10% gain in a small industry after hundreds of years of destruction to wildlife across the board just doesn’t seem ambitious enough to cut it. BNG is set to be mandatory in England from November 2023 (with some exceptions) but was already making an impact. Developers had already started following the requirements before the regulation had even come into force, including factoring in nutrient neutrality and BNG reporting to new development.

Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill

The government’s own response to a consultation on BNG said it would not “introduce broad exemptions from delivering biodiversity net gain” and yet this month we find ourselves reading the proposed amendments to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill (LURB) which would have completely thrown these regulations out the window and given a green light to developers to build on identified Nutrient Neutrality catchment land even if scientific advice suggests it could harm the environment. To make matters worse, the government have suggested that the taxpayer will pick up the bill to mitigate the damage caused while development companies profit.

But where do these free passes for polluting stop? If the development sector can, why not water companies or food producers?

As The Rivers Trust points out, changes to the bill would:
 

• tell local authorities to assume developments will have no nutrient impact, even when faced with evidence to the contrary;
• move the burden of paying for nutrient pollution from the polluters to the taxpayer;
• make long term, regressive legislative changes to environmental protections for short term gains and set a dangerous precedent for the erosion of important laws;
• throw away all the progress that has been made developing nutrient mitigation markets. [Developers, working with local authorities, with support from environmental organisations, landowners, and regulators have been working to find solutions to allow housing to progress without increasing the nutrient burden on water bodies.]
• What’s more, these changes are not necessary. Around 70% of the 100,000 houses that Government say will be ‘unblocked’ with their amendment have already been signed off and are ready to start building.
• These highly significant proposals have been rushed through at the very last minute, preventing meaningful parliamentary scrutiny. 26 pages of dense amendments were tabled with no consultation, 5 working days before debate in the House of Lords.

Daniel Wynn Head of Nature-based Solutions at Kent wildlife Trust said:

“In Kent, the Stour Catchment is quite literally flooded with nitrates and phosphates from various sources, housebuilding being just one of them. Other sources include the agricultural sector and the poorly maintained Waste-water Treatment Works (WwTW) run by the water companies. Legal policies are in place to ensure that water companies upgrade these WwTWs, but now, who can trust the Government to see this through?