Defend Nature

Nature needs defending - you can help.

Since 2022, we've been working to defend nature from the UK government's Retained EU Law (REUL) Bill. The REUL Bill threatened to give Ministers sweeping powers to remove or replace thousands of environmental laws without public consultation or scrutiny by Parliament. We fear that if these protections are lost, we'll see even more pollution poisoning our rivers, more of our wild places being damaged or destroyed, and even more wildlife threatened with extinction.

The REUL Bill is now set to become law and environmental protections remain at risk.

However, Ministers are on the record at every turn with promises not to weaken environmental protections, and we will challenge them to keep to these promises.

Read the REUL Bill latest

Why were The Wildlife Trusts and other environmental charities so concerned?

In 2022, the UK government launched a full-scale attack on nature – threatening to tear up some of the most fundamental laws we had, and announcing new proposals that would have a hugely detrimental effect on the UK's wild landscapes.

New proposals to change planning laws and create ‘investment zones’ announced in September 2022 represented a ‘free-for-all’ on nature, weakening the laws previously in place to protect it from bulldozers and concrete. The Retained EU Law Bill would also see the end of basic protections, leading to the loss of designated wildlife sites and a relaxation on pollution laws, resulting in more sewage in our rivers and streams. What’s more, the Westminster government launched a review of the new system developed to reward farmers that help to restore the environment.

You can read more about these issues in our blogs shared below:

• 28 Nov 2022 Large parts of civil society are united in opposition to the Retained EU Law Bill – it’s time the UK Government listened
• 30 Nov 2022 UK risks major embarrassment on global stage at nature COP15
• 1 Dec 2022 Time is running out for new farm schemes to halt nature’s decline and adapt to climate change
• 5th Jan 2023 Scale of nature and climate crises undermined by low ambition farm payments

These threats and others are still live - we will never stop campaigning for the natural world.

What has Sussex Wildlife Trust been doing?

Contacting Sussex MPs

We have repeatedly contacted all Sussex MPs since September 2022, most recently in May 2023 ahead of the Commons vote on Lords amendments to the REUL Bill. We've been asking them to Defend Nature on behalf of the special sites and species within their constituency, and on behalf of their constituents. Sussex Wildlife Trust also took part in a parliamentary roundtable meeting, where we talked to MPs about the threats to Sussex, alongside a range of other environmental charities. We've also sent specific briefings as the Bill passes through different stages in parliament.

We've had several face-to-face meetings and tried to meet with all Sussex MPs on these issues, though not all MPs were responsive. Check if we have heard back from your MP here. We also asked the Sussex Conservative MPs who share our concerns to lobby within their party and contact the Prime Minister on this issue.

Contacting Sussex councillors

Local councillors often have regular meetings with their local MP and are able to influence the actions of their own political parties. Therefore, we have also been meeting with the majority of councils in Sussex to explain the potential impact of the government decisions on their work and raise our concerns further.

Working in partnership

We are working in partnership with the 45 other Wildlife Trusts across the UK and our national body, The Wildlife Trusts, to deliver our Defend Nature campaign. We are also standing alongside our colleagues across the UK’s conservation sector in a joint effort to mobilise our collective members and supporters, and to make a united response to what we consider an attack on nature.

The Wildlife Trusts were one of 79 organisations that jointly wrote an open letter to the previous Prime Minister urging her to change the government's trajectory on environmental deregulation. The Wildlife Trusts also signed this joint statement from the TUC (Trades Unions Congress) given that the impacts of the Retained EU Law Bill go far beyond just environmental laws.