Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of facilitating biodiversity net gain on a non-mandatory basis for projects progressed through the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project regime.

The 25 Year Environment Plan seeks to embed the principle of ‘environmental net gain’ for development. As part of this there are a number of ways in which biodiversity net gain could be implemented through the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project regime and we will be consulting on further details.