Select committee: Environmental Audit Committee
Conclusion 11
First Report - Biodiversity in the UK: bloom or bust?
Published 30 Jun 2021
Paragraph 80
Environmental Audit Committee Biodiversity and Ecosystems All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Public expenditure on measures to promote biodiversity has been cut in real terms over recent years. As a result, levels of monitoring have been scaled back, and the capacity for assessing the state of protected areas and vulnerable species nationally has been reduced. Government bodies do not have enough skilled ecologists to provide comprehensive expert monitoring, and these bodies are over-reliant on the voluntary sector to fill the gaps which arise. Currently, local authorities do not have enough in-house ecologists to provide the monitoring which is expected to underpin the Government’s policy on biodiversity net gain.
From: Environmental Audit Committee, First Report - Biodiversity in the UK: bloom or bust? (HC 136), paragraph 80, 30 June 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 30 September 2021 (deadline 30 August 2021).