Select committee: Environmental Audit Committee
Recommendation 15
6th Report - Environmental sustainability and housing growth
Published 16 Nov 2025
Environmental Audit Committee Environmental sustainability and housing growth All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
The Government must not veer down the path of viewing nature as an inconvenience or blocker to housebuilding. In most cases housing delivery is delayed or challenged due to unclear and conflicting policies, land banking and skills shortages. Using nature as a scapegoat means that the Government will be less effective at tackling some of the genuine challenges facing the planning system. At worst, this approach could lead to the degradation of the natural world, preventing the achievement of legally- binding climate and nature targets, upon which our society and economy depends. (Conclusion, Paragraph 78)
From: Environmental Audit Committee, 6th Report - Environmental sustainability and housing growth (HC 439), 16 November 2025
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 13 March 2026 (deadline 16 January 2026).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Government welcomes the Committee's inquiry and says it will "continue to implement our reforms to maintain environmental protection while accelerating housing growth", responding to each of the 39 recommendations in turn.
- On the presumption in favour of sustainable development, the Government is consulting on changes within the wider NPPF consultation published on 16 December 2025, and says it "will consider the responses received" before finalising a revised Framework.
- On whole-life carbon assessments, the Government "is not currently considering adopting the RICS methodology" as the UK industry standard, but will "keep it under review". It intends to "maintain a voluntary approach" to carbon accounting rather than mandate it.
- On ecological resource hubs, the Government agrees that ecological expertise is critical but does not consider separate hubs "currently necessary", and says it will keep this under review. It also states it has "no plans" for mandatory ecology and carbon training in planning qualifications.
- On taxation, the Government says it "does not plan to review council tax on the basis of embodied carbon". On VAT, it states that the Chancellor is responsible for decisions on tax policy, taken at fiscal events.