Climate campaigners have handed a petition to Downing Street demanding more protections for nature.
The nature experts want Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to enact the Climate and Ecology Bill to reverse UK nature loss and set a new, legally-binding target to put Britain’s disappearing wildlife on the road to recovery by 2030.
Ornithologist Dr Mya-Rose Craig said: “It’s ridiculous that the UK Government pretends to be a ‘world leader’ on the environment when 30 million birds have vanished from our skies in the last 50 years; 97 percent of wildflower meadows have been eradicated since the 1930s; and a quarter of all mammals are at risk of extinction.
“You’d think this would send alarm bells ringing with Ministers—but it isn’t. I’m asking the Prime Minister to deliver the ‘nature positive future’ he’s promised by backing the Climate & Ecology Bill. The public are sick and tired of paper thin promises. It’s time to save our precious natural world.”
Green Party leader Caroline Lucas and Liberal Democrats deputy leader Daisy Cooper were set to join climate justice activist Tori Tsui, campaigner Sam Bentley and UK Youth for Nature co-director Ellen Bradley at No10 on Monday.
Ms Lucas said: “Halting and reversing nature’s decline is essential, with huge benefits—not only for our natural world and our climate—but also improving our health, supporting the economy, and creating thousands of skilled jobs to regenerate local communities.”
Zero Hour’s United for Nature petition has amassed nearly 17,000 signatures.
It comes as the UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world, having lost over half of its nature.
Ms Bradley said: “With the catastrophic situation of sewage in our rivers, vanishing wildlife, and polluted air, we need bold, new legislation —the Climate & Ecology Bill— to make sure we stop tinkering around at the edges and achieve the transformational changes we need to restore our natural world.”
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