The chorus of voices for nature is shrinking. How can statutory bodies and local authorities make good decisions for nature without capacity and expertise? Meriel Harrison, RSPB Senior Policy Officer explains ...
In mid-April and without fanfare, Government published its latest annual statistics on the proportion of local nature conservation sites that are in positive management for nature. The result – just 43% - shows a continuing decline; but perhaps the more shocking statistic was the response rate from local authorities providing this data. In 2008/09, 97% of councils provided information. Now only 46% do so, leaving Government openly questioning whether it is even worthwhile continuing to publish the data.
There are estimated to be 40,000 local nature conservation sites in England and although they lack the statutory protection that sites such as SSSIs have, they are often of equal quality and represent a huge amount of our best habitat for wildlife. It is therefore deeply worrying that in more than half of local authority areas in England, it is not even possible to assess whether they are being managed for the nature they contain.
Two of the main reasons given for this are high staff turnover in councils, and reduced staffing impacting on the council’s ability to produce management plans for the owners of these sites. The Local Government Association has flagged that despite 94% of people wanting to see more biodiversity, only one third of planning authorities now have access to an in-house ecologist. There is a biodiversity brain drain in action: and when there’s no voice for nature on the team, it slips down the agenda and the risk of damaging decisions increases.
But the problem runs deeper than this, also affecting those public bodies whose core remit is to protect and restore nature and to regulate potentially harmful activities. Natural England and the Environment Agency have faced staff cuts, skills shortages and a high turnover of staff, resulting in very real impacts on their ability to deliver Government targets to halt and reverse the loss of nature.
In 2020 the Chair of Natural England highlighted the impacts that cuts were having on the designation and monitoring of SSSIs, and while this led to a funding boost from Government, it has been nowhere near enough to fill the gap. In real terms, Natural England is still operating on only 62% of the budget it had in 2011, despite the continuing escalation of the nature emergency. The Environment Agency isn’t faring any better, with its staff sent to observe only 8,000 of 116,000 potential pollution incidents in 2021 due to funding cuts.
The UK Government has now set targets for protected sites in England, committing to assess the condition of all SSSIs by 2028 and for 50% to have actions on track towards favourable condition by the same date. With only 1/3 of SSSI units in England having been assessed between 2016 and 2022 and only 38% currently in favourable condition, this means a huge step up in activity is needed, both in terms of monitoring protected sites and improving their condition.
Improving condition means working with landowners and managers, building trusted relationships and offering high quality expert advice tailored to each specific site alongside the right incentives to get appropriate management in place. All of this becomes much, much harder with fewer boots on the ground and a high rate of staff turnover. An evaluation of the Dartmoor Farming Futures (DFF) programme in 2021 underlined the extent of the problem:
“None of the Defra staff engaged at the start of DFF remain in post and within Natural England the turnover of project officers with direct contact with DFF is significant; 8 in ten years... Within Dartmoor National Park Authority only 2 members of staff with direct links to DFF and who were present at the start of DFF in 2010 remain in post. The austerity measures resulting in significant reduction in staff within government agencies have directly impacted on the DFF trials.”
The backdrop to all of this, of course, is the stark state of public sector finances. We have seen over many years now the consequences of swingeing cuts to arms-length bodies, local authorities and National Park Authorities, and it is clear that when money is tight, it is nature that really feels the squeeze.
To rise to the challenge of halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030 we need transformative change so that the entire network of sites for nature, from the locally to the internationally important, can fulfil their potential. This will need a step change in the priority and resourcing given to these sites by public bodies, so that land owners and managers can work in partnership with skilled and knowledgeable advisors to drive nature’s recovery. Current and future governments must deliver the investment that is sorely needed, both for their own arms-length bodies and also for local authorities who are responsible for the local nature conservation sites on our doorsteps.
I have previously worked in a local planning department and I remember once going to a planning law conference where one of the speakers was a representative of the Environment Agency. At the beginning of his speech, he stated that the Environment Agency’s attitude towards development on areas of potential flood risk and their advice to local planning authorities considering approval of such applications was “Don’t”. It’s a shame that advice went out the window!