As the Bill makes its way through parliament, we reflect on key amendments and what’s at stake.
In March 2025, the UK Government introduced the Planning and Infrastructure Bill with the aim of speeding up the delivery of new infrastructure and housebuilding. However, together with other experts and conservation organisations, we warned that this proposed legislation threatened to weaken nature protections in England.
As originally drafted, Part 3 of the Bill created Environmental Delivery Plans (EDPs) to allow multiple development impacts, and their required restoration measures, to be considered together over much larger areas at the same time (currently development impacts are considered site-by-site). At the same time it removed many crucial safeguards vital for environmental protection.
The RSPB was so concerned by this threat to nature that we called for Part 3 to be scrapped.
Thanks to successful campaigning, backed by many thousands of RSPB members and supporters, in July the UK Government announced a number of amendments to the Bill to address these concerns.
Our detailed assessment of the Government’s amendments concluded that, overall, they address the majority of our concerns. However, this is very much dependent on further strengthening both in the Bill itself, and through associated guidance, policy, and secondary legislation, plus ensuring there are sufficient resources to enable effective delivery.
The Government’s amendments mean that EDPs will now need to contain requirements to avoid or, if that’s not possible, reduce harm upfront. Crucially the EDP must also now include the sequencing in which conservation measures will be carried out, and in cases of possible irreversible damage conservation measures must be in place before that harm occurs.
Interim Guidance accompanying the amendments states that ‘irreplaceable habitats’ like ancient woodland or limestone pavement, cannot be included in EDPs. The same guidance also confirmed that when EDPs are drafted they will have regard to the ‘precautionary principle’ (meaning a lack of scientific certainty that damage could be caused is not a reason to exclude conservation measures to prevent that damage – i.e. “better safe than sorry”).
The amendments include improved EDP monitoring requirements and if the benefits for nature fall short of what was envisaged then additional measures must be added.
The amendments also contain crucial additional measures to ensure that when developing EDPs, Natural England must have regard to how developments included will impact the overall conservation status of the affected species, as well as the effective functioning of the network of protected sites, and ensure conservation measures are included to take account of this.
This overall responsibility lies with the Secretary of State and one of the most important amendments mean they can only allow an EDP to proceed if the best available science shows the measures will “materially outweigh the negative effects” of the developments included. This means an EDP cannot be approved unless Natural England can provide clear independent evidence that nature will be in a better state by the end than when it started.
The Bill has almost finished its passage through the House of Lords, and it is anticipated Peers will pass this package of Government amendments. We are working hard to both strengthen these further and ensure that how they are written into the Bill leaves no room for doubt or misinterpretation.
We are also working to secure additional amendments for nature. These include establishing a new statutory purpose for the planning system that puts nature and climate at its heart (believe it or not the purpose of the planning system has never been set out in law); making the inclusion of nature-friendly design features such as bird and bat boxes mandatory in every new housing development; and extra certainty (and therefore clarity) on the EDP processes.
The Bill will then return to the Commons so that MPs can scrutinise any amendments passed by Peers and decide whether to keep them. At this time, probably early November, we will need your help again to ensure these key safeguards are passed by MPs.
If this significant change to England’s planning system is to work for nature, we will also need to see safeguards included in secondary legislation, and in the accompanying guidance and policy, to ensure the new laws are correctly interpreted and applied – we will be calling for these too.
