How can we enhance the environment in a post-Brexit world?

How environmental protections can and should be strengthened and enhanced in post-Brexit Britain.

There are some critical questions around resources, such as water and soil, which will be fundamental to future environmental sustainability and will need protection, conservation and improvement. The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) Commission for Economic Justice report ‘Prosperity and Justice: A Plan for a new Economy’ stated that, “Environmental sustainability must be at the heart of economic policy.” So when the government makes the pledge, “to make ours the first generation to leave the natural environment in a better state than we found it,” there is a great deal at stake for the future of the UK. Will natural capital accounting help to protect the environment or should we recognise that we cannot value everything in monetary terms? When the Prime Minister launched the government’s 25 Year Environment Plan she confirmed that, “We will use the opportunity Brexit provides to strengthen and enhance our environmental protections – not to weaken them. The EU Withdrawal Act (2018) required the setting up of an independent ‘watchdog’ to hold the government to account, and this was debated extensively throughout the Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) consultation on Environmental Principles and Governance. The government has now proposed an Environment Act, which should provide legal underpinning for the 25 Year Environment Plan. How can we influence the Environment Act? Is there the necessary cross-departmental support and resources to give the act the breadth it needs to be truly effective? This session highlights SDGs 2, 6, 13, 14 and 15.

We will invite the audience to contribute their own suggestions and by the session end we will identify three key recommendations as the most universally applicable.

This session was developed with the Ecobuild Conference at Futurebuild and IEMA

Chair: 
Eloise Scotford - University College London

Speakers: 
Maddy Thimont-Jack - Institute for Government
Martin Baxter - Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA)
Alastair Chisholm - Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management (CIWEM)
Ece Ozdemiroglu – eftec & Member of the Committee on Climate Change

Responding to the consultation on Environmental Principles and Governance

The current UK government is committed to be the first generation leaving the environment in a better state than it inherited it.
Leaving the EU will create a gap in regulations and governance, and DEFRA are currently holding a consultation on the issue, which closes on 2nd August (https://consult.defra.gov.uk/eu/environmental-principles-and-governance). The consultation offers a rare and welcome opportunity to rethink the UK’s environmental framework.
DEFRA’s proposals to rework the principles guiding our environmental policy, including the precautionary and ‘polluter pays’ principles, could have long-term and far-reaching consequences for the delivery of environmental objectives set out in the UK Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan and beyond. The proposals also raise questions about future interactions between the UK’s devolved nations, collaboration across government departments, and the role of the planning system.
This event was organised by the Edge to encourage collaboration and debate among built environment professionals and inform responses to the DEFRA consultation. It included short presentations on the current environmental framework and possible options post-Brexit, followed by views from a range of professionals. A number of response points were proposed for debate by the audience, with the intention of developing a draft collective response to the consultation.

Chair: Professor Maria Lee, Faculty of Law and co-director of the Centre for Law and the Environment, University College London

Overview of Defra Proposals and options: Dr Tom West, Law and Policy Advisor, Client Earth

Respondees:
- Richard Blyth, Head of Policy, RTPI
- Ben Brown, Policy Manager, Landscape Institute
- Ant Wilson, Sustainability & Building Engineering, AECOM

Response summary: Julie Godefroy, Head of Sustainable Development, CIBSE and the Edge

Venue: 2nd Floor Lecture Theatre, UCL Energy Institute, Central House, 14 Upper Woburn Place, London WC1H 0NN

Downloads:
Edge Debate 83 flyer- Where do we stand?

Response to DEFRA consultation, submitted 2nd August 2018 - Edge submission to DEFRA on Environmental Principles and Governance-180802