Conservatism is as much about looking to the future as it is about looking to the past. It is with this in mind that I can say confidently that conservatives understand the philosophical importance of trees. We plant a sapling knowing that we will never sit under its shade. That is a joy reserved for our children and grandchildren.
And don’t just take my word for it. Railing against short-term thinking in the previous decades, in 1982, Margaret Thatcher said that conservatives “are in the business of planting trees, for our children and grandchildren, or we have no business to be in politics at all”.
As well as being philosophically sound, trees are also integral for nature’s recovery and tackling climate change. They provide shelter to wildlife, absorb carbon, purify our air, serve as natural flood defences, cool our urban centres with their shade, strengthen the soil that surrounds them, and provide sustenance. The timber produced can also reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. If fully embraced, the path to net zero by 2050 will be a tree-lined one, supporting British businesses along the way.
And yet, despite recent improvements in tree planting rates, we are still lagging behind our target to increase tree cover to 16.5% of England’s land area. If we do not hurry up, this will prove detrimental to climate action, nature recovery, flood risk management, and our timber security.
Charitable tree planting efforts, financed by the government’s Nature for Climate Fund, are noble. We should certainly renew this funding to continue supporting these efforts, along with the public money given to land managers to provide trees, a vital public good, through our farm subsidy reform. But these efforts alone will be insufficient. We need to unleash the power of the market.
The introduction of Forestry Creation Zones across England will ensure that landowners that are well placed for tree planting are receiving the financial benefits of doing so. These zones should have lower regulatory requirements, a streamlined grant application process, and clearer guidance on the ability to stack multiple private credits for nature, carbon, and nutrients. It was fantastic to see a commitment akin to these zones in the Conservative Party manifesto last week but we need not stop there.
In the same week the general election was called, the government opened a consultation on whether or not to include trees in the UK’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). We called for the phasing in of the Woodland Carbon Code into our ETS in the CEN Branching Out manifesto as a means of unlocking more private investment in forestry.
Together, these reforms will make doing the right thing, planting a lot more trees, a whole lot easier, delivering the woodlands we want and need to restore nature and reach net zero by 2050.
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