The long arm of the law

Some positive news.

Last year, the estate managers on my street planted a couple of trees. This week they began showing their true colours, revealing themselves to be magnolias.

Magnolias are not native to the UK. You can find them in ornamental gardens in the warmer parts of the country, and when in full bloom they are stunning.

Kew Gardens in London has a particularly wonderful set of magnolia trees. They’re for show, but what a heck of a show they put on.

Image: Thomas Winward

As a non-native species, they don’t add much, if anything, in the way of value to our local ecosystems and shouldn’t be mistaken for something that is boosting biodiversity. But if the beauty of a magnolia tree is enough to make people stop and trigger a newfound interest in our natural world then that can only be a good thing.

New developments

I wrote recently about the conflict between urbanisation and wildlife in the UK as new developments infringe on the woods and meadows around our towns and cities.

So let’s take a moment to celebrate the coming into law of England’s Biodiversity Net Gain legislation. From now on, law dictates that developers must replace habitats if anything is destroyed for new homes, roads and other developments, and deliver a 10% gain in biodiversity.

This doesn’t mean you can level a forest, replace it with an ornamental shrub and calling it a day. You can’t urbanise the entire world and expect an ecosystem to thrive on a few green roofs alone. Nature needs space. Streams, hedgerows, meadows, peatlands: this legislation means developers must play an active role in helping regenerate our country’s ecosystems and getting nature back on course.

Environmental organisations have welcomed the law which has seen a lot of setbacks in its journey, but The Wildlife Trusts outlined a few key requirements to make it a success:

• Developers and Local Planning Authorities should go beyond the minimum 10% requirements and aim for at least 20% BNG (Biodiversity Net Gain) for nature.

• Local Planning Authorities must be resourced with the right level of skills and capacity across departments to oversee the BNG process, making sure it is properly implemented, monitored, and enforced.

• BNG must be ‘additional’ to existing mechanisms for nature conservation and enhancement.

• UK Government should change policy and guidance to prevent the sale of excess biodiversity units.

The law is only as good as its enforcement, and if the Government is serious about the country’s nature recovery then it will be watching this closely.

Image: Thomas Winward

Ecocide

In other environmental-related legal news, we can also celebrate the recognition of ‘ecocide’ as a national-level crime in Belgium.

Nationally, the new crime of ecocide, aimed at preventing and punishing what are deemed to be the most “severe cases of environmental degradation”, such as extensive oil spills, will apply to individuals in the highest positions of decision-making power and to corporations.

- Circular

Wanton, intentional destruction of the environment is still rampant throughout the world today and this is an exciting step on the road to readdressing the broken relationship between us and our planet.

The law is a powerful tool in the movement to reset this balance.

ClientEarth is a remarkable organisation doing great things to stand up for environmental and human health and wellbeing through litigation.

Six children are taking a case to the European Court accusing 33 governments of failing to act on climate change, imperilling their futures and stating a breach of human rights.

These cases are increasingly necessary to send a clear message that the system needs to be rebuilt. I kicked off my own professional journey in sustainability when I produced a film for The Law Society about how lawyers can enable positive change. You can watch it below.

Legal systems exist, in theory, to maintain an orderly, just society. Obviously, as we’ve seen from recent world events, what that looks like can vary radically from country to country. But a society without nature will collapse quickly, and a truly civilised society must use its legal system to protect the environment - and in doing so the health and wellbeing of its citizens.

One year of Urban Nature Diary

This time last year, I set out to write something about urban nature once a week. Bar one week when I was travelling and a short festive hiatus, I’ve managed it.

That means that if you’re new here, there’s an entire year of back posts you can check out in the archive. Dive in.

Thanks for coming with me on this weekly voyage of discovery, and if there’s anything you want to see covered in future posts just drop a comment or reply to this email. I’d love to hear from you.

I’ve got a new short documentary coming very soon so keep an eye out for that.

In the meantime, get outside.