Issue - meetings

Report of the Director - Neighbourhoods

The Ecology and Sustainability Officer and the Principal Policy Planner presented an update to the Group about hedges and hedgerows in the Borough.

The Ecology and Sustainability Officer explained that the Council had passed a Motion to protect and enhance hedgerows in the Borough of Rushcliffe and had requested that a review of the legal and policy framework be conducted.

The Ecology and Sustainability Officer said that the legal and policy framework that was within the control of the Council sat largely within two areas, being the Rushcliffe Local Plan, as part of the Core Strategy and Local Plan Part 2, and the Hedgerow Regulations, which identified hedgerows which were important and to which the Council could apply notice that they need to be retained and required application to remove. The Ecology and Sustainability Officer noted that there was a strict definition of which hedges could be covered which did not include garden hedgerows and required a certain number of species to live in it or for it to have historical importance.

The Principal Policy Planner referred to the Local Plan Core Strategy policy 17 which sought through planning applications to achieve an increase in biodiversity as a result of new development and also to ensure that new development provided new biodiversity features and improved existing biodiversity features, which included hedgerows.

In relation to the Local Plan Part 2 policy 38, the Principal Policy Planner said that this identified specific biodiversity areas within the Borough and if planning applications were submitted within those areas, it gave the Council the mechanism to seek specific types of improvements to biodiversity, including through hedgerows.

In relation to the mapped biodiversity opportunity areas, the Principal Policy Planner said that they covered a significant portion of the Borough, including around East Leake and Stanford Hall, and provided a description of what was there and what could be improved.

In relation to Planning Applications, the Principal Policy Planner said that consultation with the Ecology and Sustainability Officer and the Landscape Officer would take place for relevant planning applications, for advice on what features the Council should seek to retain and on any potential bio diversity enhancements it should try to achieve.

The Principal Policy Planner advised that the Council sought to retain hedgerows as much as possible where they contributed to the character of an area or where they provided biodiversity asset. He said that whilst it was not always possible to protect them, for example where their removal was required to facilitate access to a site, the Council would seek to negotiate replacement within the development scheme and to achieve a net gain.

The Ecolgy and Sustainability Officer explained that the Environment Act 2021 contained a legal requirement for biodiversity net gain through land planning, and although this element had not as yet been enacted it was expected to be by November 2023.

The Ecology and Sustainability Officer said that biodiversity net gain required that an environment be in a measurably better state than it  ...  view the full minutes text for item 13