As Mike McCarthy mentioned in his excellent piece in the Independent yesterday, we have our work cut out to prevent 21 March becoming a Black Wednesday for the environment.
We are working with others to make last minute pleas to the centre of the Government to ensure the reforms to the planning system and the review of the Habitats Regulations recognise the value of the natural environment to our economy.
My confidence that we will get a positive outcome is waning, but we are not giving up. We still have the people, passion and the power of evidence on our side. But perhaps alas politics is working against us. To illustrate this point, I am delighted that Tony Gent, Chief Executive Officer of Amphibian and Reptile Conservation has offered his perspective as to why newts have been in the firing line.
“The clock is ticking ever closer to the Budget Statement –an announcement that will show whether the negative rhetoric in the Autumn Statement wins over some of the positive opportunities for all that could arise from a review of implementation of the Habitats and Birds Directives in England. The significance of the European Nature Directives should not be under-estimated. It has been reassuring that, judging by recent discussions, this is not lost on the DEFRA ministers overseeing the review. We share their vision that changes should only be made if they result in better outcomes for nature conservation.
Undoubtedly, the protection given to the great crested newt will be one of the issues that has been brought to the Chancellor’s front door.
Photo credit: Fred Holmes
The species is geographically widespread across lowland Britain and therefore gives the impression of being a frequent ‘problem’ as consideration must be given to its conservation when areas in which they live are developed. This is one of the issues that is perceived to be so damaging to British industry and where ‘gold plating’ the Directives is allegedly causing harm to economic growth. However, the UK’s performance in conserving this species has also caught the eye of the European Commission whose legal team, as I write, is deciding whether further action should be taken over a series of failures to reverse the decline of the species. So how can two perspectives be so much at variance?
Although great crested newts are not rare in the strict sense of the word, they are ‘conservation dependent’, that is they need positive measures to keep populations surviving. The protection arose largely through studies in the mid 1970s that showed that about half the known great crested newts ponds had disappeared in a decade; although protection has slowed the rate of decline, it has not stopped it. Without the Habitats Directive, we would be looking at a species that would be in a much more perilous state! Great crested newts are one the few widespread species that have this level of protection – and for every ‘issue’ raised by this iconic species we can only imagine the unreported and unrecorded losses of other wildlife that slip by unnoticed.
At Amphibian & Reptile Conservation we are dedicated to the conservation of these two groups of animals. We have been looking to make the Habitats Directive work better for species such as the great crested newt. There are certainly instances where better use of resources and the good intentions of developers (many but sadly not all) could have achieved better and more sustainable outcomes for this species.
However, to achieve this there is a clear need for better targeted ‘upfront’ investment – ensuring that there is proper information and expertise available at the local level and a sound and consistently applied direction that sets the conservation objectives at national and local levels. Such ‘targets’ are now out of vogue with the current Government, and so we see money spent by developers, local biodiversity initiatives and agri-environment schemes, without a clear understanding of what it needs to achieve.
We have been actively suggesting to DEFRA new ideas that could be trialled in ‘pilot areas’. We want to explore a much better system that will help to achieve better wildlife conservation – and by providing a much clearer set of objectives ensure that developers are working on a ‘level playing field’ and can direct their financial and intellectual resources to a shared agenda. We are supporting these ideas by developing predictive mapping systems that would be directly useful for planning authorities (and nature conservation bodies) as a means for setting local targets.
Despite this, and the technical support and input from a wide range of conservation NGOs offered to Government, we are concerned that opportunities for positive gain could still be lost. We are looking for positive signs that the small investments needed to make a real difference for developers and for nature will be made – perhaps by directing some of the funding identified to kick-start the housing market to ensure that this is done sustainably. So will the budget announcement show a ‘penny wise, pound foolish’ view of the environment; or will we see a judicious use of resources now to ensure a better outcome for nature and save angst and inconvenience for developers? ARC will remain, side by side with the RSPB, in banging the drum for nature conservation after the budget speech. Let us hope we can bang it together in celebration.”
Do you agree with Tony?
I am sure that he would be delighted to hear your views.
An excellent blog Tony. It is good to hear that ARC is being so pro-active. Let's hope Mr Osborne similarly takes a new proactive attitude to the natural environment, but I have my doubts.