On Wednesday 28th September our CEO Liz Ballard, Living Landscape Development Manager Nicky Rivers and Advocacy Officer Ian Cracknell met with Clive Betts, MP for Sheffield South East at Owlthorpe Fields.
Mr Betts has been particularly supportive of the campaign to save Owlthorpe Fields, so it seemed an ideal location to meet in his constituency, following the fantastic recent news of its designation as a Local Wildlife Site.
We shared our concerns about the Government’s recently proposed changes to environmental legislation and Mr Betts was happy to lend his support to our #DefendNature campaign on this. Mr Betts told us that Labour are currently producing an environment policy, which is expected to be published within the next few months.
We will write to Mr Betts and ask for Labour Leader Keir Starmer’s position and more details about Labour’s policy on the environment.
As well as other local matters like Sheffield’s imminent draft local plan, we also asked Mr Betts about wider planning issues, such as how he thought the Levelling Up Bill might be affected. Mr Betts is Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee. He provided details about how to write questions to the Committee, which they would then put to the new Secretary of State.
We will work with The Wildlife Trusts nationally to follow up on writing to Mr Betts about this.
To find out more about our #DefendNature campaign, click here.