Speeches by Chowns.

“I will be brief. I strongly support amendment 6, tabled by the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington. Accepting the amendment would go a long way towards addressing the concerns about enforcement, late payment and so on. Let us adopt it.”

“The Minister’s response indicates that he believes it is reasonable to expect the Government, and therefore essentially taxpayers, to bear the costs of environmental damage caused by developers. That is surely not reasonable. How will the structure set out in the Bill work, be viable, protect nature or indeed improve i…”

“I fully support this.”

“I will try to speak briefly. Amendment 92 is particularly important considering the conversation that we have just had about my previous amendment. Effectively, the nature restoration fund offers the opportunity for developers to buy the right to pollute in one location if that money is used to create habitats or suppo…”

“I beg to move amendment 92, Clause 62, page 93, line 42, leave out from “features” to the end of line 2 on page 94 and insert— “are funded by the developer. This amendment would define the purpose of the nature restoration levy as being that costs incurred in maintaining and improving the conservation status of environ…”

“rose—”

“The Bill overrides that.”

“rose—”

“I have two points. The first was raised by the Office for Environmental Protection in its advice. I was going to come to it when discussing clause 58, because it is specifically about the amendment of EDPs. Only Natural England and the Secretary of State get to decide if an EDP should be amended. There is not even any …”

“I apologise.”

“rose—”

“With respect, I do not think that the point made by the shadow Minister does make the Minister’s case for him, because it was about taking a site-by-site approach, which is not a good analogy here. We already have capacity under existing environmental law to take a district-wide approach—for example, district-level lic…”

“rose—”

“rose—”

“It is important: the whole point of Committee is to look at the detail and really get to grips with it. Replacing “are likely to” with “will”, as my amendment seeks to do, would not make it necessary to conduct a site-by-site assessment. It relates to the wording that clause 55 applies to the EDP overall. It is about t…”

“Will the Minister explicitly address the concerns expressed by the OEP, in its advice on clause 58, about the fact that there is no requirement to consult? The Secretary of State “may direct” Natural England to consult on an amendment, but does not have to. There is also no mandatory requirement to initiate a review or…”

“Where in clause 58 does it specify that consultation should or should not happen? I cannot see it.”

“rose—”

“I beg to move amendment 54, in clause 61, page 93, line 2, at end insert— “(2A) Natural England may only accept a request if Natural England is satisfied that the developer has taken reasonable steps to appropriately apply the mitigation hierarchy, including by seeking to avoid harm to any protected feature. (2B) For t…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship again, Dr Huq. I thank the Minister for his comments. He emphasised that his intention in the Bill is to continue to protect nature at the same level, but differently. He emphasised a different but not worse approach. I share his desire to ensure that even if it is differe…”