"Newt Credits" - from Chappers

The following is an article from The Times, i thought it may be a useful one to send round for the environmental side of the course as it suggests a potentially interesting policy.

‘Newt credits’ could settle environmental disputes

Scheme to offer planners the power to “offset” large infrastructure projects that harm wildlife populations as a way of resolving disputes between developers and opponents.

Communities could be offered “newt credits” to accept new roads, housing and power stations in natural habitats.

Owen Paterson, the Environment Secretary, said that he wanted to offer planners the power to “offset” large infrastructure projects that harm wildlife populations as a way of resolving disputes between developers and their opponents.

“We need to end this mortar exchange between improving the economy with big infrastructure projects and protecting the environment,” he said in an interview The Times. “We end up having these terribly sterile debates about newts and copses and nothing gets done.”

Under the idea, developers would compensate local people for environmental damage by buying credits to improve the natural habitat elsewhere in the area. Environmental groups that objected to such projects could apply for these credits, which would give them funds to spend on conservation programmes.

“You could use environmental credit on huge projects like high-speed rail or a power station or small ones like a farmer wanting to extend a dairy,” Mr Paterson said. “Usually the poor old newts lose out in the end and only the lawyers win, this way everyone benefits.”

The idea is attributed to Dieter Helm, an economist at the University of Oxford and chairman of the Natural Capital Committee, established in March to advise on the value of Britain’s wildlife habitats.

Environmental groups reacted cautiously to the idea. Ben Stafford, of the Campaign to Protect Rural England, said that compensating for lost habitat was not always as straightforward as replacing one natural site with another. “There is evidence that compensatory habitat isn’t as good quality as the areas it replaces,” he said. “It might not have the populations of wildlife or the same sort of landscape.”