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That this House has considered e-petition 550379, relating to the protection of hedgehogs.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I thank the petition creator and all those who signed it for giving us this important opportunity to address this issue. My right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne), who is sorry not to be able to be with us today, has talked about the incredible contribution made by the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, which is based in his constituency.
The last time we had the pleasure of a debate on hedgehogs in Parliament was almost six years ago, in November 2015. During that debate, the former Member for Penrith and The Border, the right hon. Rory Stewart, gave a fantastic, impassioned speech on hedgehogs from the Dispatch Box, and the former MP for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport called for the hedgehog to be made the UK’s national animal. Although I have a great appreciation for hedgehogs, and despite this country’s love for them, I agree with Mr Stewart that choosing an animal that rolls into a ball at any sign of danger and sleeps for half the year would not necessarily portray the image that we want as a nation. Before that debate in 2015, the last time Parliament debated the issue was in 1566, when, in true Tudor fashion, it discussed a bounty on hedgehogs, so this is only the second debate on the subject since 1566, and I am honoured to introduce it.
We have come a long way in how we treat hedgehogs in this country. Thankfully, we have moved past the idea that hedgehogs are a pest that prey on resting cows and need to be exterminated. We now have a greater understanding of the great British hedgehog. Their image is now used in election campaigns or to teach children the green cross code to the tune of “Stayin’ Alive”. They are now a much-loved part of the British countryside, and although they are not particularly cuddly, these prickly creatures have come to occupy a very special place in the hearts of people not just in my constituency but right across the UK.
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Twigg. I congratulate the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) on speaking so eloquently on behalf of the petitioners. A remarkable number of people signed the petition, started by the British Hedgehog Preservation Society. That shows how much people in the UK really care about hedgehogs and protecting the nature around us. As I went to the Library to print out my speech, I was accosted by one of the staff who found out it was about hedgehogs; she insisted on showing me a photograph of the hedgehogs in her garden.
The issue is everywhere. In fact, the hedgehog has been voted Britain’s most popular wild mammal in several surveys over the years. As we heard, since 2000 hedgehog numbers in the UK have declined by half in rural areas and by a third in urban ones. According to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the main reasons for the decline are the destruction of their shelters and habitats, increased levels of traffic, poorly planned roads and the use of pesticides. Those are all things that we can and should work to prevent. The hedgehog has been listed as vulnerable to extinction in the UK, conceivably within the next decade if nothing is done to reverse the decline.
I recently visited Sandra Lowe, who lives in Woodside in my constituency. Sandra operates a hedgehog rescue called Hope for Hedgehogs. When people bring hedgehogs to her, she works tirelessly to ensure that they are properly treated. She works with local vets to ensure they get the right medication and does everything that she can to keep them. For the little ones, that involves getting up three times during the night to feed them the appropriate food. It certainly is a labour of love, and thankfully there are people who will help her with that. Sandra funds the endeavour entirely by herself, and she says it costs around £50 for each hedgehog to be treated and released. The organisation is entirely self-funded, which is why I am supporting her efforts to obtain funding to create a hog hospital, so that she can treat hedgehogs properly.
Just to let Members know, I intend for the Opposition spokesperson and the Minister to start winding up at no later than 5.40 pm. Given the great deal of interest and the number of speakers, please keep your contributions to around four and a half minutes, which will ensure that everybody gets in. I ask for your indulgence in that.
It is a pleasure to take part in the debate under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I thank all the people who signed the petition.
From the emails that I received from constituents about the debate, I was deeply worried to learn of the disastrous decline in hedgehog numbers. Both my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) and the hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) have referred to the numbers: we have lost half of all hedgehogs in rural areas, and a third in urban ones. As we have heard, this much-loved animal has recently been added to the IUCN red list and designated as vulnerable, with an appreciable risk of extinction within 10 years. There is a need for urgent action, and I want to press the Minister to enhance protection for hedgehogs, as called for in the petition.
Planning rules need to be changed to require the presence of hedgehogs to be taken into consideration when deciding whether to grant permission for development. Will the Minister also provide reassurance that the quinquennial review of schedules 5 and 8 to the Wildlife and Countryside Act will not lead to any weakening of protections? Most important of all, I urge the Government to include hedgehog habitats in their extensive programme of nature recovery. There can be no doubt that decline in habitats is a key driver in the loss of hedgehogs. We need the biodiversity net gain provisions of the Environment Bill to be implemented so that a new income stream is created for protecting wildlife habitats, and I want to see councils also encouraged to include hedgehog recovery strategies in their local nature recovery strategies, which the Bill will require them to establish.
Of course, I note the efforts by Natural England and DEFRA to create a national nature recovery network, which is a further, crucial opportunity to alleviate the pressure on the vulnerable creatures that we are debating today. Connected wildlife corridors can make a huge difference to the recovery of the species. I hope the voice of today’s petitioners will be heard by Ministers, particularly as they design and implement this country’s new system of farm support. There can be little doubt that some modern farming practices have made survival more difficult for this country’s favourite prickly mammal. The environmental land management schemes, which will replace the European Union’s common agricultural policy, should aim to secure and restore hedgerows and habitats to give our hedgehogs a bit of a Brexit dividend.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg, and a pleasure to speak up for the hedgehog.
Although I represent a largely urban constituency, the hedgehog is equally at home among our parks, gardens and untidy corners of the countryside, and many residents of Hull West and Hessle welcome its presence. I want to pay tribute to the fantastic work of Carolyn Harman of Hessle Hedgehog Rescue in providing care for sick and injured animals and advice on making the area hedgehog-friendly. Sadly, as mentioned by hon. Members already, hedgehog numbers continue to decline. The People’s Trust for Endangered Species surveys, conducted by citizen scientists, demonstrate that hedgehog numbers have fallen by around 50% in the past 20 years, so there is no doubt that urgent action needs to be taken, and the petition reflects that urgency.
The Government’s response to the petition stated that they have,
“not previously moved to protect this species under Schedule 5”—
to the Wildlife and Countryside Act—
“as it is not clear that such protection would be of benefit to the species, in so far that: we have no evidence that intentionally killing, taking or injuring hedgehogs is currently an issue; and it would not address the main threat of habitat loss.”
That appears to refer to the protections found in section 9(1). Although the petition mentioned only schedule 5, I assume it also refers to the protections under section 9(4), which include protections for habitat from intentional disturbance and damage.
The Minister may not be aware of this, but I am proud to be the butterfly conservation species champion for the brimstone butterfly, which is the flagship species of Hull’s Butterfly City project. She may also be interested to know that the marsh fritillary, the heath fritillary, the large blue and the swallowtail, which is the UK’s largest butterfly, are also included in schedule 5 to the Wildlife and Countryside Act. I assure the Minister that the main threat to all those butterfly species is habitat loss, and they are also included in section 9(4) of the Act. Every other mammal that is considered vulnerable to extinction in the UK is listed in schedule 7: the hazel dormouse, two species of bat, and the Orkney vole.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg.
I follow a fellow parliamentary species champion, the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy), but I am perhaps the most topical species champion today, because I am the species champion for the hedgehog. Indeed, as the Minister knows, because she is committed to these issues, I have been, probably not biting her ankles, but prickling them over this issue for some time now, and I intend to carry on doing so. Six years have passed since this House last debated the hedgehog. I very much hope that we will not need to debate it again soon, but I also hope that, if a debate is necessary, it will not take another six years.
It is a national tragedy that we have lost so much of our wildlife. If we look across the range of species that have suffered catastrophic declines in recent years, the picture is profoundly disturbing and worrying. The hedgehog’s decline goes back further than the last 20 years, though. In the 1950s, there were nearly as many hedgehogs as people in the United Kingdom; today the hedgehog population is only a tiny fraction of our population, with perhaps only 1.5 million hedgehogs surviving. We have to turn the situation around, not just for hedgehogs but for all the species that have suffered such declines, and we must start doing it now, because we cannot allow numbers to continue to go down.
There is a variety of reasons why these declines have happened. It is true that there has been habitat loss. Sadly, over the years too many hedgehogs have died on our roads, although I have to say that it is relatively rare to see a dead hedgehog on our roads nowadays. Of course, we see rather a lot of dead badgers on our roads, but that remains a subject of debate. I am not here today to point a finger at the badger, although are issues around the competition between species for ever-diminishing habitats. I am here to argue for tangible Government measures to address the issue.
It is, as always, a pleasure to speak in the debate. As is often said in this Chamber, conservation is not a hobby for me; it is a duty that I take a very seriously.
I am pleased to follow the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), and I wholeheartedly endorse his request to retain hedgerows and enhance field edges. That is something that I do on the land where I have the opportunity to have some input. I am blessed to live on the family farm, with my son living on the farm up a very long laneway. It gives me a chance to see where the hedgerows are and to ensure that the edges of the lanes are well kept. During lockdown, the ability to wander through the beautiful countryside surrounding my home as I read my briefings and did my daily Bible readings, was one of things that kept me sane. It made me appreciate what I have outside my window that little bit more. I have a real passion to ensure that my grandchildren will have the same ability to enjoy nature when they reach my age, so retaining hedgerows and field edges is something that I wholeheartedly endorse.
Hedgehogs are under extreme pressure. The right hon. Gentleman referred to badgers, and the information that I have is hedgehogs are a bit of a delicacy for badgers, which are renowned for feasting on hedgehogs more than they probably should. One part of this fight for our countryside is the declining number of hedgehogs. Ulster Wildlife has an entire section on its website about how to help hedgehogs due to their decline, and it states:
“Hedgehogs are in trouble—they have declined by 30% in the last 10 years alone and there are now thought to be fewer than one million left in the UK. Whether you live in town or country, you can help to look after these much-loved creatures by providing food, water and shelter.”
Ulster Wildlife’s useful site outlines ways to help and provides links where people can donate and adopt a hedgehog. When my boys were at school, they did a project on hedgehogs, and I sincerely hope that there are still school projects to raise awareness of just how vital these little creatures are to our ecosystem.
I remind Members to wear masks while in this room, if they are not speaking, please.
5:05 pm
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Despite their relatively new-found popularity, however, the British hedgehog is facing a number of varied and complex threats. Before the debate, I had the pleasure of meeting representatives from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, who told me that since 2000 we have lost half of our rural hedgehogs and a third of our urban ones. Sadly, they were recently added to the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list for Britain as vulnerable, which means that they have an appreciable risk of extinction in the next 10 years.
As I have said, the problems that hedgehogs face are numerous. It is difficult to point to one factor as the sole reason for the population’s decline. That is partly a reflection on how varied their habitats can be. Modern farming practices have been blamed, including the use of pesticides that kill hedgehogs’ prey or potentially poison the hedgehogs themselves. A loss of habitat has similarly been pointed at—modern agricultural practices use larger fields and fewer hedgerows—and of course there are questions about the impact of climate change on hedgehogs’ hibernating habits.
Hedgehogs are protected from some methods of killing and collection under schedule 6 to the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. The petition asks for that protection to be increased to schedule 5, which would offer protection from all intentional killing, injuring or taking, and prohibit them from being sold. The Government’s response to the petition states that they have not previously moved hedgehogs into schedule 5 because they have no evidence that hedgehogs are being intentionally killed. I am sure we are all grateful for that and I hope that people would not do something as cruel.
However, there is a problem of hedgehogs being sold. In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of people owning hedgehogs as pets, although that is the African pygmy hedgehog, not the variety native in the UK. The sale of those cute little creatures—although they are not as cute as the great British hedgehog—is not necessarily the problem. The problem arises when people start to snatch the hedgehogs they find at the bottom of their garden and sell them on for £300 a pop. That threatens population numbers and creates biosecurity risks. Moving hedgehogs to schedule 5 would prevent it.
I would welcome other measures to help hedgehog numbers bounce back. I know from speaking to Anne Purchase-Walker, who runs HoggyStockton Rescue, that a large number of hedgehogs fall victim to weed strimmers. Greater awareness by people using them and a quick check of the grass before starting to cut would go a long way. Similarly, developers creating less robust fencing and walling, and hedgehog highways that link up green spaces so that hedgehogs can better forage for food, would also be welcome.
The Government are not deaf to the issue. I was pleased to see in their response to the petition that they are committed to taking action to recover threatened native species, and they are exploring the use of powers in the Environment Bill to strengthen commitments to improve the status of this threatened species. The petition’s request to move hedgehogs to schedule 5 would go some way to help the numbers bounce back. However, we welcome any policy that would help protect this much-loved animal and I would happily look at what the Government can propose.
One thing, however, is clear: we need to act now. Losing half the rural population in two decades shows that the decline is rapid and the situation is critical. There is no point letting the situation get worse before we step in and try to halt the decline. Intervention now will make this task easier and cheaper, and ensure that our prickly little friends still take pride of place in Britain’s countryside.
A lot of people, such as Sandra, are doing amazing work to help protect hedgehogs, but it is not enough to rely on the work of volunteers. The Government must commit to protecting our wildlife. Most of all, we know that Sandra and all the other volunteers want to see the prevention of injury, damage and deaths of hedgehogs as the priority. That is the important thing. Real consideration for nature and wildlife must be at the core of our planning decisions and many other decisions.
I and many others, including the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, are concerned by the proposed changes to the status of many of our widespread species in the United Kingdom, including hedgehogs. The Joint Nature Conservation Committee review will provide recommendations to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. As far as I understand it from Sandra and others, the upcoming review seeks to change the eligibility criteria of the hedgehog, currently listed on schedule 6, if that is the recommendation. Sandra tells me the review proposes that statutory nature conservation bodies will retain protected status only for species that are in imminent danger of extinction in Great Britain. That is clearly too low a bar to set, and I hope the Government will be much more ambitious. The effect of the proposed changes could be that rather than increasing protection for hedgehogs, as called for in the petition, their current lower level of protection could be removed. Sandra tells me that she has concerns about the impact of the quinquennial review, so I hope that the Minister will be able to assure me and Sandra that there will be increased protection and no diminution of it.
The Government’s national planning policy framework has a chapter on conserving and enhancing the natural environment. It opens by setting out how planning policies and decisions should contribute to and enhance the natural and local environment. Priority species are defined in the NPPF as those included in England’s biodiversity list, which is published by the Secretary of State under section 41 of the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006. As I have set out, the list currently includes hedgehogs.
With some narrow exemptions, the Environment Bill of 2021-22 contains provisions intended to make it mandatory for housing and development to achieve at least a 10% net gain in value for biodiversity, and a requirement that habitats for wildlife must be left in a measurably better state than before the development. Many of us know that although we can see the words on the page when it comes to planning policy guidance, we need to see the impact on the ground. We are seeing too many hedgerows lost as well as other biodiversity losses, even now. In today’s debate, we are calling on the Government to increase the protection offered to the hedgehog under the Wildlife and Countryside Act by moving it to schedule 5 as a first step in helping to protect our precious wildlife.
As we have heard, in 1566 this Parliament put a bounty on hedgehogs, which apparently led to the death of as many as 2 million in the period up to 1800. I really hope that today’s debate has a much more positive outcome. The Government have a stronger commitment to nature recovery than any of their predecessors ever before. When they set what I hope will be a really ambitious 2030 target for species conservation, I urge them to ensure that a thriving hedgehog population is included in that as a very important goal.
Even a layperson who is familiar with the behaviour of hedgehogs can imagine how the provisions in section 9(5) would protect them; detailed knowledge of hedgehogs’ habitat requirements is not necessary. Many people know that hedgehogs like the shelter of a nice compost heap, or being tucked up beneath the garden shed. In fact, hedgehogs can journey up to 2 km per night and can build several nests across their home range, so it is clear how protection of hedgehogs’ nesting sites from disturbance or harm, as well as protection of hedgehogs themselves from disturbance or harm, would be of benefit.
The hedgehog and other wildlife can also be helped through changes to the planning law. Biodiversity can be built into housing and commercial developments in many ways, such as hedgehog highways, wildlife corridors, and swift boxes and other bird boxes built into buildings. There are already fantastic examples, backed up by research, of the benefits of these innovations. It just requires the will from Government to make them mandatory.
The petition is timely because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) mentioned, the Wildlife and Countryside Act is undergoing its five-yearly review of the species included. However, I am extremely concerned to hear that the terms of this year’s review have been changed and that, contrary to what a reasonable person might expect given the well documented decline in biodiversity across the board, this is likely to result in fewer species under protection, not more. Under the new standards, an animal or plant species would be protected only if it were in imminent danger of extinction, so dozens of species face losing vital safeguards, and action to protect a species would come only when it was in crisis, which might be too late. That cannot be right.
I understand that over 30 conservation groups have written to Ministers voicing their concerns. I would welcome the Minister taking the opportunity today to explain why it was felt that the standards needed changing and how the Government expect the changes to halt the decline in species numbers. Although I welcome the assurances given in response to the petition relating to forthcoming legislation, given the changes to the way that the 1981 Act is being reviewed, it is difficult to have confidence that the final detail will measure up to the promises. The hedgehog needs increased and meaningful protections now, not fuzzy—or even prickly—assurances about its future.
There has been a lot of debate about the specific review taking place this year. There is genuine cause for concern there, which I hope the Minister will address in her remarks, because none of us wants a formal reduction of protection for species. She knows my concerns about the way the quinquennial review approaches creatures such as the hedgehog, and I hope she will be able to set everybody’s mind at rest.
I hope the Minister recognises from the scale of this petition the genuine public concern. I echo the words of congratulation to the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, to Hedgehog Street, which has done a fantastic job in promoting the need for action, and to all those groups around the country doing so much to protect hedgehogs, to rescue hedgehogs that are in danger, to rescue baby hedgehogs that may not survive the winter, and to look after those that have been injured. I pay tribute to the team at the Wildlife Aid Foundation, just outside my constituency in Leatherhead, who do a fantastic job. I have been down there on many occasions to see the work they are doing with hedgehogs that have run into difficulties in life..
That work and all those different projects all around the country are valuable, but there is a bigger-picture issue to solve here. It was brought home to me this week by a message I received from one of the hedgehog groups distraught that, just down the road from where it is based, a developer starting to clear a site ahead of development had killed a significant number of hedgehogs just by clearing the undergrowth alongside a roadway to make way for that development. In accordance with the law, we in this country do a lot of work before we develop sites, such as checking for bats and newts, but I want the Government think differently, because searching for an individual species on a development site is not the right way forward. We need an holistic approach to nature on a development site. Of course, we still need to develop for the future—we need to provide housing for the future—but we should do that with care. One thing I hope for from the Government in the next few months is a plan to turn the current system into one of holistic analysis of what wildlife is on a site and what needs to be protected, so that we do not simply bulldoze a roadside or cut down a hedgerow with no regard at all for any animals inside it. All too often, hedgehogs are inside it. That change is urgently needed.
The Minister will be aware that I tabled an amendment to the Environment Bill to move the hedgehog into schedule 5 protection. I did not push that amendment to a Division because I understand that the legislative framework is not right for today’s world. It is focused particularly on human intent against animals, and nobody is seriously suggesting that everybody wants to kill hedgehogs. However, I expect quid pro quo from the Minister, which is a proper, urgent review of the legislative framework to address things such as the circumstance I just described, where a developer does not have to look holistically for the full range of species on a site but can just make sure that there are no bats or newts and everything else just gets bulldozed out of the way. That cannot be right, and I very much hope that she will change that.
I ask two other things of Ministers. The first involves habitats for hedgehogs and other species. One reason why we have seen the decline in numbers has been the disappearance of hedgerows. I very much hope that the implementation of the Agriculture Act 2020 and the new agriculture support framework will genuinely encourage farmers to put back some of those lost habitats. CPRE is in the process of launching a timely campaign to get more hedgerows planted in this country, and I hope the Government take that on board and ensure that the support they provide to farmers encourages them not only to have wider margins at the sides of existing fields, which is to be welcomed, but to start replanting hedgerows for the future, because they are vital habitats.
My final request to the Minister is this. It is important for species that travel long distances to be able to do so. Colleagues have mentioned hedgehog highways and developers being encouraged to put holes in fences. That is very good and should continue to be encouraged, but we also need, in areas of open country where there are development threats, to make sure that corridors exist for wildlife—not only hedgehogs but other species—so that we do not lock away one bit of habitat from another, losing the movement between the two and so ultimately the species decline and die. That also has to change.
Those are my three requests to the Minister. We need to ensure that we have proper planning for highways between different habitats, and that we look at supporting the recovery of hedgerows. We particularly need protections for species such as the hedgehog in law, to prevent developers from simply ripping up a site with no regard for what is there. If the Minister delivers all that, she will be able to take pride in the fact that she has played a big part in turning the tide on the tragic decline of hedgehog numbers.
My constituents in Strangford who signed the petition outlined the dire straits in which our population of hedgehogs find themselves. Since 2000, hedgehog numbers in the UK have declined by half in rural areas and by a third in urban ones. I very rarely see any of them about now, even with our taking a direct interest in trying to retain the habitat for them. For that reason, BHPS is asking for hedgehogs to be moved from schedule 6 to the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 to schedule 5, to allow them greater protection. I would support that.
My constituents are concerned that the 2021 review seeks to change the eligibility criteria affecting hedgehogs. It is proposed that the country-based statutory nature conservation bodies will retain protected status only for species that are in imminent danger of extinction in Great Britain. I would suggest that the hedgehog is very clearly in such danger. The shift in focus will give preferential consideration to GB red-listed species as defined by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, but the IUCN guidance specifically identifies the automatic use of red-list categories in policy as an “inappropriate use” of the red list, so that is the wrong bar to set. We need to get it right, so I look to the Minister with respect, as I often do, and ask her to respond, which I know she will.
The effect of the proposed change would be that rather than increasing protection for hedgehogs, as called for in the petition, their current, minor level of protection will be removed altogether. The change will make it legal to sell hedgehogs; worse still, they will lose protection from killing and injury. I just cannot believe that that is possible.
The petition makes it clear that hedgehogs have widespread support and are in need of enhanced protection. The hedgehog has been voted Britain’s most popular wild mammal in several surveys. In the BBC’s wildlife survey in 2013, it won 42% of the vote. In 2016, the hedgehog won more than twice the votes of the second-placed animal in the Royal Society of Biology’s survey. Clearly, hedgehogs are a favourite of the general public, so removing hedgehogs’ legal protection would be widely viewed as inappropriate and an extremely perverse response to a parliamentary petition backed by more than 100,000 voters.
Will the Minister reflect on this well thought-out flag that has been raised? We need to do something, and we are all saying that we must do the right thing. We need to enhance protection and to fund a breeding programme to release hedgehogs into safe places throughout the countryside. I look to the Minister to outline that very plan of action.