Otters and beavers among rare wildlife ‘at serious risk’ from planning reforms
Otters, beavers and dormice are among threatened wildlife that could be put at risk by new planning proposals, green groups have warned.
Senior ministers have highlighted species such as bats, spiders and snails to prevent the development of new homes and basic infrastructure, and proposed changes to planning rules that they claim will work for growth and nature.
As part of the proposed plans, developers could pay taxes for their impact on nature.
A report by the Wildlife and Countryside Connection (WCL) coalition of 90 nature organizations has warned of a “black hole” in evidence that proposals to charge developers rather than follow existing rules to protect wildlife would work for many species.
Under the government’s Planning and Infrastructure Bill, new environmental development plans will allow schemes that could harm legally protected areas or wildlife to pay a “nature restoration levy” to ensure habitat or species are generally improved on a “strategic” scale.
The government has touted a “district-level licensing” approach for great crested newts; This approach speeds up construction plans by replacing old measures used to capture, count and move amphibians with a faster system that charges developers to create new high-quality habitat.
However, according to WCL’s report, the only species currently where the strategic approach has proven effective are great crested newts.
Without solid evidence and effective field trials, moving away from the current approach to field-level conservation measures to prevent and minimize damage to protected species could pose a “serious risk” to already declining wildlife and feral animal welfare, conservationists warn.
They suggest that numerous British species are potentially at risk, including dormouses, otters, barn owls, gray seals, Atlantic salmon, badgers, hedgehogs, rare fungi and plants and even recently reintroduced beavers.
For some species that are confined to a few areas, are territorial, or cannot move easily, this approach is unlikely to work; For many species, including widespread but declining species, there is “patchy” or “insufficient” evidence on whether this approach will be successful, they said.
The report highlights potential risks to protected species such as:
- With numbers falling by 70 percent since 2000, dormouse populations are fragmented and require well-connected hedgerows, woodlands and hedgerows to survive;
- Otters, which require extensive, unpolluted river systems, are highly territorial and difficult to relocate;
- Barn owls, which depend on open countryside and barns for breeding, suffer from habitat loss due to the conversion of old buildings and the lack of suitable nesting sites;
- Lizard orchids are flowers that grow only in certain regions and are difficult to relocate due to their complex relationship with fungi and other soil organisms;
- Beavers, which have recently been reintroduced as the government supports larger-scale releases, could fall under compensation measures that could undermine their populations and long-term recovery.
The report noted that specific conditions may need decades or centuries for wildlife to emerge, and warned that “roosts, territories and habitat structures cannot simply be moved into a spreadsheet and restored later.”
Conservationists called for a cautious approach and said the new process should not be applied to the species without definitive scientific evidence.
It should be avoided completely due to a defined list of irreplaceable habitats; Rules should prioritize avoiding harm over mitigating it; The report emphasizes the need to collect more robust, site-specific data on wildlife before implementing environmental development plans.
Richard Benwell, chief executive of Wildlife and Countryside Link, said: “There is a giant black hole when it comes to protected species.
“If applied to the wrong wildlife, the new approach could accelerate the decline from chronic to catastrophic.
“The government has rightly pledged to follow the best scientific evidence, but detailed processes are needed to ensure the new system is not abused for profit or political gain.
“We call for a transparent scientific process, a rigorous precautionary approach and real-world data to ensure wildlife is not swept under a concrete rug in the name of growth.”
Becky Pullinger, head of land use planning at The Wildlife Trusts, said: “The Planning and Infrastructure Bill threatens to be a major overhaul of wildlife protection regulations and poses a significant risk.
“Scientific evidence must be the basis of any planning process and if its strength weakens there will be serious consequences for nature and the wild places that communities take pride in; species such as dormouses, otters and barn owls could all be affected.
“It is possible that new development and improving nature can go hand in hand, and we therefore ask that the government work with its peers to ensure that nature protection is at the forefront of new legislation.”
A government spokesman said: “We completely reject these allegations. The design of the Nature Restoration Fund has been carefully considered and will deliver more for nature, not less. With the Planning and Infrastructure Bill we will create a win-win for the economy and nature, so we can build the infrastructure and 1.5 million homes the country urgently needs.”
