England’s wildlife watchdog failing to protect crucial sites, say campaigners In three years Natural England has designated just two new SSSIs, which protect areas from development.
“Natural England seem to have ground to a halt with SSSI notification across the country in recent years, largely because an underfunded organisation barely has the capacity to even monitor and review the status of their SSSIs, as has been well documented.
The rate of Natural England’s SSSI creation has slowed in recent years after highs of 10 new SSSIs in 2011-12, eight in 2018-19 and six in 2020-21.
On average over the past 15 years, Natural England has designated four new sites of special scientific interest (SSSIs) each year.
Wildlife campaigners say that Middlewick Ranges, a former Ministry of Defence firing range earmarked for 1,000 new homes despite being the second-best site in the country for rare nightingales, is one of a number of threatened, wildlife-rich places that should have been made an SSSI in recent years.
