Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution

The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution welcomes the belated implementation in the UK of the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive insofar as it applies to projects to bring uncultivated land or semi-natural areas into intensive agricultural production.

The Commission has been studying the environmental implications of land use and procedures for environmental impact assessment as part of a wider study of environmental planning . Although the report of the study will not be published until the spring, there are specific matters raised by DEFRA's consultation letter of 4 September 2001 on which the Commission wants to ensure its views are taken into account now.

The consultation document gives the impression that regulations are being introduced grudgingly because of the infraction proceedings brought against the UK in the European Court of Justice. In emphasising its intention to apply the new regulations in co-operation with farmers and other land managers, and take account of business needs, DEFRA envisages that there will be very few cases in which it has formally to refuse consent. There is no adequate recognition of the widespread concern about the environmental damage caused in the past through conversion of semi-natural habitats to intensive agriculture, and the consequent hope that the new regulations and DEFRA's administration of them will provide an effective means of preventing such damage in future.

The Commission would wish to see the following:

1. effective publicity to bring the new regulations to the attention of every farmer, rural landowner and rural land manager
2. a process for the initial screening of projects which employs rigorous environmental criteria, is administered by staff with appropriate environmental understanding and experience, and is not influenced by non-environmental considerations
3. an independent assessment, probably based on sampling, of the pattern of DEFRA's decisions at the screening stage
4. a monitoring system which can show whether projects which should be submitted for screening are being submitted, and a commitment to prosecute where they are not. The DEFRA consultation documents do not discuss the need for monitoring
5. the inclusion of the local planning authority in the list of consultees, as well as the statutory environmental agencies
6. publication of an annual report on the operation of the regulations.

The annual report should show the number of applications for initial screening, the number of projects on which an environmental impact assessment has been required and DEFRA's decisions on those projects. It should include the independent assessment of the initial screening process (point 3 above), the results from monitoring (point 4 above), the number of breaches of the regulations detected and the number and outcome of any prosecutions. The annual report should also give DEFRA's overall assessment of the contribution the regulations are making to conserving semi-natural habitats and curbing environmental damage.

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