Heather and Grass etc. Burning (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2025

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Thursday 30th October 2025 Lords Chamber

These leaders recognised the ancient wisdom of preventive burns, calling them “Indigenous” and “cultural”, so my final question for the Minister is: why do this Government accept Natural England’s recommendations when our own Prime Minister signed up to the use of controlled burning only four months ago at the G7 conference? The blame for future and much larger and more damaging wildfires, which could—indeed, will—lead to deaths, will be laid fair and square at the feet of Natural England and this Government.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, as a life Peer, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Caithness for tabling this Motion, which has enabled us in this House to hear from the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and my noble friends Lord Shrewsbury and Lord Leicester, three hereditary Peers—four, including my noble friend Lord Caithness—who have tremendous experience of safely managing moorland and using controlled burning. In particular, my noble friend Lord Leicester is regularly cited by Natural England and Defra as leading one of the finest private nature reserves in the country. Goodness knows how many official visits have been made to his estate to show others how it should be done. Therefore, I think it is terribly important that the whole House and Defra should pay attention to the wise words of my noble friend.

I am absolutely certain, although I am speaking from the Back Benches, that I will probably agree absolutely with my noble and hereditary friend Lord Roborough when he makes his speech from the Front Bench. I drafted my notes on the assumption that the excellent noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, would be back with us today, but that is not to be. So I hope the noble Lord will pass on our remarks and I know others in the building will pass on our remarks to the noble Baroness.

I wish to raise a related matter about the destruction of heather moorlands when the old straggly heather is not controlled properly through rotational burning. Noble Lords will be aware, as we have heard already, of the fires at Saddleworth Moor in 2018, 2020 and this year. Since 2007, the Peak District has had fires which have destroyed 77 square kilometres of moorland. In real money, that is 30 square miles destroyed, in nearly all cases by disposable barbecues. Just after the 2018 fire, which took three weeks to extinguish, people were again found on an unburned bit of the heather moor with disposable barbecues lit again, leading the Manchester fire chief to say that it beggared belief how stupid they were.

I want to demolish the myth perpetuated by some commentators that these fires are because of climate change. That is simply not true. There is no known case anywhere in the world, and certainly not in the UK, where a wildfire has started because of spontaneous combustion caused by global warming or climate change. There are no cases anywhere of dry grass spontaneously combusting. Wet grass tightly packed into hay bales can ignite when the chemical reaction causes the temperature to get to 250 degrees centigrade. Trees can self-ignite if the external temperature reaches, again, 250 degrees centigrade. Our temperatures have not quite got to that level yet. Dry heather cannot self-ignite. Of course, we all accept that when the habitat is bone dry it will burn more easily if a fire starts, and if there is wind it will burn more ferociously.

So how do so-called wildfires happen? Quite simply, in every case they are caused by humans, either deliberately or, in a minority of cases, accidently. The vast majority are caused by carelessness or stupidity, as in nearly all the cases of those Peak District fires. One was caused by a discarded glass bottle acting as a magnifying glass for the sun and one was a controlled burn this year—Beeley Moor—which got out of control due to a wind change. That should not have happened, but it is very rare.

In June 2022, the magnificent Thursley Common national nature reserve, which I have visited, was devasted by a massive fire, most likely started by a disposable barbecue. Almost half of the of the rare heath was destroyed. The Surrey fire chief said, “Help us to prevent wildfires; pack a picnic instead of a barbecue”. There was devastating fire in Wareham, Dorset, linked to barbecues, and it contributed to Dorset Council’s decision to ban them in many areas. This led to a subsequent council report that showed

“a huge increase in BBQ related fires from 2016 to 2020”.

There are hundreds more incidents that I will not go into, including 300 in Greater London itself—it is not just the urban fringe in the countryside—leaving a London fire chief to call for a ban on these filthy disposable barbecues.

My noble friend Lord Caithness had an amendment to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill that we did not debate yesterday, calling for the Government to do more on public education on the risks of wildfires in the countryside. I also want the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, when she is back in action, to do more private education: private education of the remaining supermarkets who continue to sell these dangerous items.

Keep Britain Tidy advocates for banning disposable barbecues due to their significant fire risk and environmental damage. It highlights the fact that these barbecues cause wildfires, injure people and create hazardous litter when left hot and uncooled, sometimes causing fires even in public litter bins. The organisation is campaigning for retailers to stop selling them permanently and encourages the public to support these efforts.

I congratulate the majority of shops and supermarkets that have stopped selling them, but too many still do. That is why I want the Minister to call in the other retailers still selling them and give them a bit of private education on the sheer destruction they are causing to our wildlife, habitats and heather moorlands by continuing to sell these things. If retailers insist on selling them, I believe they should be banned.