Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to the recommendations of The University of Manchester’s Building Utopia publication, whether his Department has plans to make an assessment of the potential merits of increasing green spaces and the role of communities in urban greening as part of the secondary legislation for the Environment Act 2021.

This Government has a world leading target to halt nature’s decline by 2030 and we know that will require action to recover biodiversity across the country including in our urban areas. To support that work, Natural England is working with Defra and other partners and stakeholders to develop a Green Infrastructure Framework. This will include a menu of green infrastructure standards that will help local planning authorities and developers meet requirements in the National Planning Policy Framework to consider green infrastructure in local plans and in new development.

The Green Infrastructure Framework will be fully available later this year. The aim will be to embed the Framework in national planning guidance and policy, which will be important to ensure that good green infrastructure is secured for all communities through the planning system.