Minutes:
Question:
I believe in response to the 30x30 obligation that the UK signed up to that we have requirements to ensure we protect 30% of our land by 2030. I believe the Nature Recovery Strategy which is a Berkshire wide strategy run by Windsor and Maidenhead is part of this. Does WBC foresee any issues or conflicts allowing a local authority completely surrounded by green belt land making biodiversity decisions for Wokingham Borough?
Answer:
Thank you for your question. The 30 by 30 challenge is the objective of the global community to conserve 30% of terrestrial and marine habitat by 2030. The UK pledged to meet this objective along with nearly 200 other countries.
In the UK some 17% of terrestrial and 8% of marine areas are currently under some form of environmental protection and the challenge nationally is to increase that protection, by identifying new areas deserving of similar protection using the means provided through current legislation. Our marine environment is an area of national focus, where detailed consideration is currently being given to the designation of new marine parks.
However, at a local level, local authorities have a key role to play in identifying additional areas deserving of habitat protection and in identifying areas where landscape and habitat rejuvenation should be considered. In Berkshire the local authorities are working together to deliver a Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS) for the county, with the intention for the final strategy to be published in Autumn 2024. The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has taken on the role of being designated the ‘responsible authority’, with a wide group of representatives working collegiately on the steering group, including Wokingham Borough Council. The work does not enable the Royal Borough or any other party to make decisions on behalf of Wokingham.
I should also clarify that Green Belt is not an environmental designation and has no purpose or status in law as protection to local landscape or habitat. Green Belt has very different statutory purposes, which are set out in the National Planning Policy Framework.
Supplementary Question:
The Berkshire Local Nature Partnership has mapped biodiversity opportunity areas across Berkshire. Wokingham Borough fares poorly with regards to this, but we do have two and they follow the River Loddon. Based on a previous response to question Councillor Ian Shenton intimated that biodiversity remediation would be targeted where it would be most effective. These biodiversity opportunity areas are, I assume, likely places. A significant area of land in one of these BOAs is a current hot topic for the LPU. It is an area of land which the landowner is keen to sell for housing, and it comes as no surprise when looking at the stakeholders in the Berkshire Nature Recovery Strategy Steering Group, one of them is the University of Reading, the same landowner whose business model is trying to sell off land in only one of two Biodiversity Opportunity Areas in the whole of Wokingham Borough. I am sure their vested interest is in keeping the price of their land high. I see this as a potential conflict of interest. Does Wokingham Borough Council agree with my appraisal of the situation with regards to the University of Reading, or does it condone the University of Reading’s representatives’ inclusion in the Steering Group?
Supplementary Answer:
I cannot comment on anything to do with the University of Reading land as far as housing is concerned. I can only comment from an environmental perspective. It is very early in the process of developing the local Nature Recovery Strategy, and there is an awful lot of work still to do.