Planning bill petition - Protect the Wild

Scrap the Planning and Infrastructure Bill

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Dear Steve Reed MP and Matthew Pennycook MP

I am writing to express my deep concern over the Planning and Infrastructure (PI) Bill recently introduced by your government. If passed, this Bill will have devastating and irreversible impacts on British wildlife, and I urge you to withdraw it immediately.

The legislation proposes to allow developers to destroy precious habitats by simply paying a “Nature Restoration Levy”. This commodification of nature is fundamentally flawed and ecologically dangerous. It assumes that ancient woodland, wetlands, and rare grasslands are interchangeable and can be replaced elsewhere – a belief that is not only scientifically inaccurate, but morally indefensible. As countless ecologists and conservationists have made clear, biodiversity is highly location-specific, and once a habitat is destroyed, it cannot simply be recreated by planting trees somewhere else.

The UK is already facing a biodiversity emergency. One in seven species is at risk of extinction, and 41% are in decline. Yet this Bill weakens local environmental protections and turns nature conservation into a pay-to-destroy scheme. Developers will be given a green light to bulldoze through fragile ecosystems for short-term gain, with no obligation to repair the damage where it occurs.

Worryingly, your Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, openly dismissed the need to “worry about the bats and the newts” – species that are not only protected by law but symbolic of the wild heritage we stand to lose. This language and the policies it supports reflect a disturbing disregard for environmental stewardship.

The PI Bill also proposes to fast-track major infrastructure projects by easing compulsory land purchases and diluting Environmental Impact Assessments. This could see an increase in environmentally destructive projects like airport expansions, new roads, and even more prisons – all pushed through with minimal scrutiny and maximum environmental cost.

Species like badgers—already decimated by a government-sanctioned cull—face further peril. Under the new proposals, companies can destroy badger setts if they contribute to a restoration fund, with no clear strategy for protecting displaced wildlife. This is not conservation – it is a rubber stamp for destruction.

This is not the vision of a government that promised to lead on environmental protection. Since coming to power, Labour has supported the badger cull, failed to take action on fox hunting, backed the bird shooting industry, and now seeks to undermine planning protections for wildlife.

We need a future built on genuine sustainability, not environmental sacrifice for corporate convenience. True progress is measured not in the miles of concrete laid, but in the ecosystems we preserve and the species we protect.

I urge you, as Ministers responsible for the sponsoring departments of the Bill, to stand up for nature and ensure that environmental protections are strengthened—not stripped away—under your leadership.

We must not trade away our natural heritage for short-term profit. The UK’s wildlife deserves better. The public demands better.

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Scrap the Planning and Infrastructure Bill

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