In moving government Amendment 194B, I will speak to all government amendments consequential to it. I am pleased to be introducing today a new biodiversity net gain requirement for nationally significant infrastructure projects. This complements the existing provisions in the Environment Bill for biodiversity net gain for all other development and fulfils the Government’s recent commitment in response to the Dasgupta review. This will ensure that new nationally significant infrastructure projects, such as new roads, railways or airports, will contribute to our vision of a nature-positive future.
These government amendments will also enable the Government to extend net gain to major projects in the marine environment in the future, once a suitable approach has been developed, so that developments at sea will be required to increase marine biodiversity as
well. I hope that this is welcomed by the noble Lords, Lord Teverson, Lord Randall and Lord Blencathra, in particular, who have spoken with great passion on the protection of the marine environment. The detail of the requirement will be brought forward through policy statements following consultation, and we will waste no time in implementing this measure. We will publish a consultation later this year, which will include proposals for an appropriate transition period and a range of other important details.
In addition, I am pleased to say that the new version of the biodiversity metric for development under the Town and Country Planning Act was launched earlier today by Natural England. It is accompanied by a draft small sites metric, which is designed to provide process simplifications for small sites aiming to achieve biodiversity net gain. We will be looking at the responses to this draft small sites metric and wider engagement later this year, and will consider further opportunities to simplify net gain for small developments.
I know the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, is due to speak to this group, and that the net gain clauses were the subject of one of the recommendations of the report on the Bill from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. I am therefore pleased to take this opportunity to inform him that the Government will be accepting all the recommendations of his Committee. I will write to the Committee today, and of course I will deposit a copy in the Library, and I will table a couple of government amendments on Report.
To return to the subject at hand, I look forward to hearing contributions from noble Lords about biodiversity net gain more broadly as part of this debate. I thank all noble Lords—there are too many to name—who spoke at Second Reading in support of extending biodiversity net gain to nationally significant infrastructure projects. I hope they will take some comfort in knowing that they have played a part in moving the Government and that the Government have listened to them. I beg to move.
Amendment 194C (to Amendment 194B)