Today, the Westminster Government will respond to the Independent Panel report on the future of forestry in England.
Set up in response to the furore over government proposals to sell off public forests, we rather liked what the Independent Panel said. You can read our response to their (July 2012) findings here.
Two significant things have changed since the Panel reported:
- the public spending envirnoment has not improved, so look carefully at what is said about financing the public forest estate.
- Defra has outlined proposals for the future of Environment Agency and Natural England, so the obvious question to ask is whether the consultation will now be broadened to influde forestry.
I'll let you know what we think of the Government plans later today.