A number of constituents have contacted me following the European Commission's 'fitness check' for the EU Birds Directive and Habitats Directive, together known as the Nature Directives. The Commission's objective is to find out whether the Directives are suitable for the purposes for which they were intended.
Part of this process involves automatically consulting certain interest groups in each EU member state. Here in the UK these are the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Department for Energy and Climate Change and the RSPB. The European Commission also ran a public consultation on its website, which closed in July 2015. I hope constituents who have contacted me were able to contribute to this part of the process.
The Nature Directives have an important role to play and the last Coalition Government reviewed the way these Directives are implemented in England. It found that generally they are working well but identified 28 measures that would make compliance simpler. The bulk of these measures have been introduced already and the remainder are currently being implemented. Further detail on these measures is available online at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/progress-of-the-habitats-dir….
In Bexhill and Battle constituency, we are fortunate to live in a landscape which is rich with nature and wildlife. With 75% of the constituency within an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, I will support measures which continue to find the right balance between preserving our environment whilst enhancing the lives of those who live amongst it. By way of example, I recently visited Pevensey Levels with the Environment Agency and Natural England and was hugely impressed with the manner in which our agencies and residents were protecting and enhancing this hugely important area of the constituency. As Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Bees, I will continue to ensure that Government policy continues to protect pollinators and other wildlife and I will look forward to discussing any changes with Government Ministers should these be proposed.