It went almost unnoticed, but it promises to bring about the biggest change in the countryside since the Agricultural Revolution, and might even cement David Cameron’s much-mocked ambition to make his “the greenest government ever”.
For the recently released first White Paper on the natural environment in 20 years pledges to reverse centuries of destruction of wild life and landscape. And it commits the Government to doing so by making their preservation part of national economic planning.
Yet the publication of this radical manifesto received less than 800 words in all the national press put together – half of them in The Daily Telegraph – because ministers seem to want it to escape attention. For the first time I can remember, the media were excluded from a White Paper launch and no real attempt was made to drum up interest.
Was it because Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman was scared by the disastrous reception of her plans to sell off forests? Or was it precisely because the document is so bold that the Government fears a backlash – or, worse, has no intention of implementing its contents?
Yet something pretty dramatic is needed to preserve what is left of the wonders that once thronged our broad acres. Since 1945, the country has lost 97 per cent of its flower-rich meadows, 94 per cent of its lowland raised bogs, 79 per cent of its lowland heaths and enough hedgerow to encircle the globe eight times – mainly to intensifying agriculture. Some two thirds of farmland species of plants, mammals, insects and birds are declining, some precipitously: the lapwing is down by 45 per cent in just 40 years, the skylark by 53 per cent, and the grey partridge by 90 per cent.
The rate of destruction has slowed recently, with reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy and increasing grants to farmers to conserve nature. But a natural stocktaking published recently concluded that a third of the vital services that nature provides – like pollination, clean water supplies and the provision of topsoil (just one centimetre of which takes a century to form) – are diminishing.
So it is quite something that the little-publicised White Paper should pledge to make this “the first generation to leave the natural environment in a better state than it inherited”. It goes on to promise “to put the value of nature at the heart of our decision- making” because “a healthy, properly functioning natural environment is the foundation of sustained economic growth, prospering communities and personal wellbeing”.
Words, words? Maybe. But it is revolutionary enough that a government should have uttered them, since environmental conservation and economic growth have long – erroneously – been seen to be antagonistic. And they are accompanied by unprecedented measures that could turn them into reality.
The stocktaking itself was the first of its kind anywhere in the world in attempting to put a value on nature’s services – concluding, for example, that pollinators are worth £430 million a year to British agriculture, or wetlands £1.5 billion for their contribution to water quality. The White Paper proposes to put this “natural capital” right “at the heart of government accounting” by including it in national accounts. And, in another world first, it commits to setting up a special Natural Capital Committee which will report to the Chancellor of the Exchequer when such natural assets are being diminished, and suggest how to augment them.
There’s action planned at the grass roots, too. Farmers will be able to be paid, for example, for practices that protect water supplies. The Government will help local people to set up special protected areas in the wider countryside. And over-abstraction of water from rivers will be tackled.
Will it work? That’s the question, for much of it depends on goodwill rather than the law. The Natural Capital Committee will not be statutory, unlike its climate-change counterpart, and may simply be ignored. And much of the local measures depend on voluntary action – an interesting test of the Big Society project.
Worse, the thrust of the White Paper seems to run slap into changes to the planning system prepared by Eric Pickles aimed at prioritising development and “local financial considerations”. And in a bout with the formidable Community Secretary, the lightweight Miss Spelman could be reliably backed to lose. So the umpire in Downing Street might have to intervene if the Government really wants the new green revolution to take place.
Science blowing hot and cold on the 'hibernation of the sun’
There’s sensational news from the sun (and, yes, the “s” is in lower case). Three studies all suggest that it may go into “hibernation” for decades from around 2020 because the sunspot cycle is slowing down.
Frank Hill, of the US National Solar Observatory, calls the findings “highly unusual and unexpected”, and climate sceptics are excited because it happened before, between 1645 and 1715, during the “little ice age”, when the Thames famously froze.
Could this happen again? Or will there be a “Goldilocks climate” (not too hot, or too cold, but just right) where global warming offsets a nasty cooling – intriguingly proving wrong both climate doomwatchers and the sceptics who doubt the effect of greenhouse gases.
Alas, no such satisfying, satisfactory outcome is likely. First, it is far from certain that the hibernation will occur. Then, scientists hotly dispute whether the last one caused the big cooling – Hill himself
seems to be a doubter – and even many who believe it also blame increased volcanic eruptions, which threw cooling dust into the atmosphere.
Worse, temperatures fell by only half a degree centigrade worldwide (though more in Europe) during the little ice age, while a rise of some four degrees is expected from global warming this
century. So – even if it happens and does have an effect – a hibernating sun could only buy us a little much-needed time. You could say it’s a flaming shame.
America’s most unwanted: the crows with cops in their sights
Ever wondered why a flock of crows is called a “murder”? Police in the north-west American city of Everett might be about to find out.
In scenes that could have been written by Daphne du Maurier, the birds are putting the cops in a flap by dive-bombing them as they go in and out of their police station. Lt Bob Johns complains: “They’re like velociraptors.”
Another officer tried to scare them off by using his police car siren – only for them to respond by covering the vehicle with droppings.
Unfortunately for the police, crows are very intelligent animals. They have been known to drop nuts on roads for passing cars to crack them open.
And research has shown that they can recognise faces and transmit information about people they dislike by squawking. And they bear grudges.
Ruth Miller, of Washington State’s Department of Fish and Wildlife, warns: “If your cops have done something that the crows perceive as a threat, they could be keying in on them.”
By law, they can only be shot if “found committing or about to commit depredations upon ornamental or shade trees, agricultural crops, livestock or wildlife”. So trigger-happy US lawmen can’t retaliate.
Instead, they are being urged to use umbrellas. However, since crows can commit faces to memory, they may remain undercover cops for some time.