Over 80 conservation leaders and businesses call on Starmer’s successor to reverse “unprecedented” backsliding on nature

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A coalition of over 80 leading conservation organisations, businesses, scientists and landowners – including CIEEM – has written to prospective candidates in the Labour leadership race, demanding an urgent reset of the Government’s approach to nature recovery, following Keir Starmer’s resignation announcement on Monday.
An initial letter has been sent to Andy Burnham MP, and will be sent to each leadership candidate as they are announced.
Sir Keir Starmer has confirmed that he will stand down as Labour leader and Prime Minister, with a successor expected to be in place by September. The letter, coordinated across the conservation and business sectors, highlights that his premiership presided over an unprecedented regression in environmental protections and policies, despite Labour’s 2024 manifesto commitment to reverse the nature crisis and “deliver for nature… without weakening environmental protections.“
This includes notably diluting Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) requirements and the provisions of the Planning and Infrastructure Act as the clearest examples of this reversal, with laws which once required developers to avoid environmental harm loosened to permit unmeasured and accelerated habitat loss.
The letter sets out four core asks for the incoming leader:
  1. embedding nature into national economic and security infrastructure;
  2. protecting nature “at the point of harm” by halting Environmental Delivery Plans and rejecting BNG exemptions;
  3. backing nature-friendly farming, including an end to badger culling and a ban on bee-killing pesticides; and
  4. putting communities, health and nature at the centre of planning reform.
The coalition includes a wide range of organisations from across the nature and conservation sector, from major wildlife charities and rewilding pioneers to ecological consultancies, habitat banking firms, lawyers and private investors. Among them Chris Packham, Dale Vince, Isabella Tree and Charlie Burrell of Knepp Estate, Professor Sir John Lawton, Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta, chief executives of environmental charities including the Bat Conservation Trust, Buglife, WildFish, the Mammal Society, CIEEM and Wild Justice, alongside businesses such as Arbtech, Nattergal, BNGx, Mozaic Earth, and the Environmental Farmers Group.
Speaking on behalf of the signatories, Alexa Culver said:
“This is the broadest coalition of nature voices and nature businesses assembled to date, proof that the call to halt and reverse this Government’s retreat from its own manifesto promises comes from right across the sector. Keir Starmer leaves office having overseen the most significant rollback of environmental protection in a generation. Whoever succeeds him by September has a narrow window to change course, to protect nature at the point of harm, restore the integrity of Biodiversity Net Gain, and honour the promises that won Labour’s mandate in 2024. Nature recovery and economic growth are not in competition, and this letter shows that the people building Britain’s natural capital economy, and protecting nature, agree.”