Truss and the Environment. One Step Forward, Two Steps Back?

Is the Government up to tackling the critical issues of climate change and environmental protection? Lucy Wood (Director and Climate Solutions Leader UK&I) and Rhiannon Smith (Sustainability Associate) at Barton Willmore, now Stantec

Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini budget launched at a time of high public anxiety. We have a new monarch, a new Prime Minister and cabinet, geopolitical instability and energy and cost of living crises. The proposals – tax cuts, energy price freezes and investment zones to boost economic growth – caused ‘a little turbulence’ in the market, to quote the Chancellor. But beyond the U-turns and Gilt market fluctuations that have dominated the headlines, some of the smaller announcements are more quietly sinister.

Environmental protection

Loosening planning rules to release more land for commercial use and housing, whilst removing environmental protection offered by legislation has the danger of undoing the positive results for nature recovery and our health and wellbeing that are being delivered across the country through considered and thoughtful placemaking within policy and legal constraints.

EU legislation is blamed in the Chancellor’s rhetoric for causing planning to stagnate, but it is actually domestic legislation that was transposed from EU law and retained after Brexit with the specific purpose of retaining environmental protection. In fact, the Office of Environmental Protection (OEP) was brought into existence by the Environment Act to fill the anticipated “governance gap” left by Brexit.

The OEP has already voiced its concerns about environmental protection being watered down and a failure to publish several implementation reports for the EIA regime by May this year, which would provide helpful input to reform. OEP written evidence to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill Committee | Office for Environmental Protection (theoep.org.uk)

Accelerating infrastructure

?Kwarteng has announced plans to accelerate new roads, rail and energy infrastructure, stating that in 2021 it took 65 per cent longer to get consent for major infrastructure projects than in 2012. Working in planning, we know all too well the frustrations of the system – but there is no direct evidence given by the Chancellor to suggest that the delays are the fault of legislation or regulation.

Environmental assessment at plan and project level can be arduous and burdensome, but it isn’t the system that is at fault – rather, the system would work if it was adequately resourced.?Not to mention to disruptive impact of short-term political aims getting in the way of dealing with long-term challenges.

We all want renewable energy infrastructure to be delivered more quickly, including offshore wind.?But cutting the cited “barriers and restrictions” in a knee jerk reaction is not the way to go. Most practitioners agree that environmental assessment could be improved and streamlined. This should be done through considered review of the current system and evaluation of what isn’t working as well as it could (for example the Government’s failure to publish implementation reports).

I share the OEP’s concern that rapid reform proposed by the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill (LURB) and now the mini-Budget, must be done with caution and with due regard to other challenges such as aligning with the Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP) and the legally binding targets set under the Environment Act 2021 and the UK’s Net Zero commitment.

Reaching Net Zero

?Amid the mini-budget whirlwind, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy launched a Net Zero review, aiming to identify new ways to deliver the legally binding 2050 target. This is in response to the successful legal challenge that found the Net Zero Strategy unlawful. We won: Government’s Net Zero Strategy is unlawful - Good Law Project

The press release reaffirms the UK’s target to reach Net Zero by 2050 and seeks innovative ways to improve energy affordability and security. However, the dominating objective of economic priority in the Net Zero review is concerning. With a key aim of the review set to “scrutinise” the planned green transition to ensure it will provide economic growth, it is possible that action plans in the existing Net Zero Strategy will be watered down or dropped entirely if they’re not considered “pro-business” or “pro-growth”.

Couple this with the outcomes of the mini-budget Growth Plan that extend our planned production of fossil fuels – launching new licensing for oil and gas production in the North Sea and lifting the moratorium on fracking for shale gas production – and there appears to be a high risk that the UK’s Net Zero transition will be negatively impacted.

The outcome of this 3-month “rapid review” is expected to be reported by the end of 2022, just in time for an update to the Net Zero Strategy policy paper to be released by March 2023.?So, we can expect that the updated Net Zero Strategy will provide greater clarity on how the proposed plans and policies will meet the required carbon budgets, including how the current five per cent shortfall to the sixth carbon budget will be resolved.

We are still optimistic that SMART targets (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) can be set that maximise social and environmental benefits of decarbonisation as well as the economic. After all, a strong economy needs a healthy natural environment.

So, is Team Truss up to the job on the environment and climate change? With rhetoric and buzzwords taking precedence over detailed policy, it’s hard to tell.?We must hope that the OEP, Climate Change Committee, Infrastructure Commission and others are listened to as experts rather than Government shooting from the hip on such critical issues.