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Environmental Impact Assessment (Agriculture) (England) Regulations 2006

Perhaps I may save myself from writing a letter. In answer to the question of why UK regulations are tougher than those in other member states, the restructuring rules are a very light touch, given that we transposed them much later thanother member states. One of our problems is that, from 1988, we in this country did nothing for nearly15 years. That is probably the root cause of our problem, because we did that under infraction pressure and the European Court of Justice case law emphasised the need to interpret the directive broadly. Infractions are brought against member states that define the directive too narrowly, so the UK opted for a broad interpretation. The uncultivated land and semi-natural area rules are tougher here than in most member states because we wanted to protect valuable areas that were not already protected by environmental designations following the major loss of uncultivated and semi-natural areas during the 20th century. We introduced thresholds to the rules in light of the reduced threat to uncultivated land and semi-natural areas following CAP reforms and the rapidly expanding agri-environment schemes. That is the reason. In some ways it goes back to what was done under infraction pressures after we did nothing from 1988 to 2001. Then we got caught and had to deal with it in that way.