Craig Bennett, chief executive of The Wildlife Trusts says:
“News that the Government’s flagship Environment Bill will suffer yet more delays is deeply troubling. When he introduced the Bill, the Prime Minister said it 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. To make up for lost time, the Government must substantially ramp-up its environmental ambition. This must start with putting a legally-binding target to reverse nature’s decline by 2030 on the face of the Environment Bill when it returns, and proper funding for landscape recovery to deliver it.”
