A Norwich City Council meeting on Thursday saw a Green councillor encourage other council members to set higher targets to protect wildlife such as hedgehogs, bats and bees in the city. Councillor Denise Carlo, who represents Nelson ward, was concerned that the city might adopt the minimum ten per cent target for Biodiversity Net Gain for new development instead of aiming higher.
Councillor Carlo said:
“A ten percent target would lack ambition and the council should aim for the twenty percent target adopted by other local authorities such as South Cambridgeshire, Cambridge, Lichfield, Swindon and Guildford.”
Defra recommends ‘at least’ ten percent Biodiversity Net Gain which all planning authorities will be mandated to achieve in new planning permissions under the Environment Act 2021.(1) The Greater Norwich Local Plan which the city council helped draw up also requires ‘at least ten percent’.(2)
Councillor Denise Carlo said:
“Norwich Green Party councillors have been calling for measures in new developments to support biodiversity for many years. Trees, hedges, gardens, bird and bat boxes, green roofs and walls are all needed, and we are pleased that councils and developers have been given a statutory duty to improve biodiversity. The UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world, with industrial farming, urbanisation and pollution among the main factors.(3) In addition, the little nature we have left is struggling in the face of climate change as the summer heatwave and drought has shown. The ambition behind legal obligations on councils in the Environment Act to achieve Biodiversity Net Gain and prepare Local Nature Recovery Strategies is to create “more, bigger, better and more joined up” areas for nature recovery.(4)
“Since 2001, the City of Norwich population has grown by nearly twenty percent and development has resulted in the erosion of numerous small patches of nature. The city council has made little effort to replace the green stepping stones lost, as planning and biodiversity is not a priority for the Labour council. A twenty percent target for Biodiversity Net Gain is, therefore, vital in helping to re-build nature networks.”
The city council is currently working on a new Biodiversity Strategy. Green councillors have said that they hope this strategy will be ambitious and that it will begin to halt the decline in the city’s wildlife.
Notes:
1) ‘Consultation on Biodiversity Net Gain Regulations and Implementation’, Defra, Jan 2022.
“The mandatory requirement is to achieve at least a 10% biodiversity net gain increase from the pre-development biodiversity value.” (p12)
2) Greater Norwich Local Plan, Policy 3: Environmental Protection and Enhancement.
The Natural Environment: “It will need to be demonstrated that the gain to biodiversity is a significant enhancement (at least a 10% gain) on the existing situation.”
3) Biodiversity: UK is one of the world’s most nature depleted countries. It is in the bottom 10% globally for biodiversity.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/58863097
4) The Environment Act – what’s on the horizon for local authorities?
Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trusts
“Designed for compatibility with existing wildlife protection legislation, well-planned Local Nature Recovery Strategies (LNRS) will guide where to site Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) and in turn, well implemented BNG will benefit LNRS’s efforts to recover nature. These initiatives aim to drive England towards the targets of the 25 Year Environment Plan by creating more, bigger, better and joined up areas for nature.”
https://www.bbowt.org.uk/blog/robert-cooke/environment-act-whats-horizon-local-authorities
Norwich Green Party has eleven councillors on Norwich City Council, where it forms the main opposition party, and three on Norfolk County Council, representing the wards of Mancroft, Nelson and Thorpe Hamlet in Norwich.
