Government postpones the Environment Bill (again)

If not now, then when? …. If not us, then who?

Yet again our Government is providing clear evidence of its lack of commitment to tackling the climate emergency and the wide range of environmental issues at home such as the improvement of air and water quality, the reduction in waste at home and for export (including plastic), producer responsibilities, the reduction in global deforestation, the protection of wildlife and much more.

This week the Government decided to postpone the Environment Bill after the debate in the House of Commons on Tuesday. Amendments to the planned legislation were debated by MPs on Tuesday but it will not return to the Commons until the next Parliamentary session later in the spring at the earliest.

The proposed legislation should be the biggest shake-up of environmental legislation in decades as the Government seeks to redraw the regulatory framework after the UK’s departure from the EU.

Campaigners are angry at yet a further delay to the Environment Bill that was first launched way back in July 2018, supposedly in readiness for Brexit.

The Government claim that they want to leave nature in a better state than they found it. They state their intention is to set targets but these will not become legally binding until 2027. This is far too late and provides ample opportunity to downgrade the aims, objectives and standards set by the EU and to which the UK was required to support and comply with prior to Brexit.

Green groups have warned that the delay to the Environment Bill could damage the UK’s credibility at key international environmental summits this year, including the Conference of the Parties (COP 15) to the Convention on Biological Diversity in China in May 2021 and the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow in November 2021.

Beccy Speight, Chief Executive of the RSPB, said: "The slow, stop-start nature of the Environment Bill's passage does not help us take the rapid action needed to tackle the nature and climate emergency. Our only hope is that this delay is used to improve the Bill. Environmental groups including the RSPB have made a series of measured and sensible improvements, such as legally binding targets to turn the tide on the loss of nature, and these should now be seriously considered. These changes would help us get our own house in order at a time when the Prime Minister wants to show international leadership in the run-up to the key global biodiversity and climate summits later this year."

Craig Bennett, Chief Executive of the Wildlife Trusts, said: "The news of yet more delay is deeply troubling. The Prime Minister said the Bill was 'the huge star of our legislative programme… a lodestar by which we will guide our country towards a cleaner, and greener future'. The fact that the Government plans to end the Parliamentary session over a year on without having delivered the 'star' of the programme will raise questions over its commitment to leaving the environment in a better state for the next generation. Recently, the Prime Minister explicitly committed to taking urgent action to put nature on a path to recovery by 2030 as part of the UN Decade of Action. But over a year into the decade, very little progress has been made."

Rebecca Newsom, Head of Politics at Greenpeace UK, said: “Time and time again the Government tells us that ‘urgent action’ is needed to restore nature, that it will ‘build back greener’ and that we can’t afford to ‘dither and delay’. What then is it playing at by delaying the most important piece of environmental legislation for decades?”

Kierra Box, campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said: “The Government has taken every opportunity to weaken everything about this Bill: from giving Ministers the power to guide our supposedly independent environmental watchdog to defending sweeping loopholes that allow huge swaths of Government to discount the environment when making decisions.”

Ruth Chambers of Greener UK said: “The UK government has consistently claimed environmental leadership but after four years of delays we are still without crucial laws to restore nature and tackle climate change. Ministers must now use this extra time to improve their plans around upholding green laws.”

So come on Government .... stop the "greenwash", prevarication and delays and take some positive and constructive action to improve and protect the environment, nature and wildlife!

💚🦆 🦉🦋🐝🦊🦡🌼 🌳💚

Stay safe, stay well, stay strong, stay connected with nature