This piece is an extract from our A View from the Forest (previously Forestry Features) newsletter, which is emailed out at 4PM every Wednesday with a round-up of the week's top stories.
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FOR many of the tens of thousands of people employed in the UK's forestry industry, July 4 2024 will be just another Thursday.
But for others, it will be a pivotal day for the future of the sector in England – for on that day, Brits will go the polls for the first general election since 2019.
(If you subscribe to Forestry Journal and, more specifically, these newsletters, there's every chance the politics will be your cup of tea. If not, there's always next week.)
In all likelihood the end result is going to be a Labour government led by Sir Keir Starmer with an overwhelming majority. But let's pretend, at least between us all here, that there's still a contest to be had and votes to be won.
Keeping in mind that forestry is devolved (so any decisions made by the next government would only apply to England), what should we be expecting from the parties when it comes to the sector between now and July 4?
That's a tricky question. Those with long memories will recall the runners and riders falling over one another to promise wildly unachievable planting targets in the run up to 2019's vote; the end result being the Conservative's manifesto commitment of creating 30,000 hectares of new woodland on an annual basis. To say this goal has been missed – and missed repeatedly – would be putting it mildly.
As it stands, the evidence suggests tree planting won't be such a priority this time around; and maybe that's no bad thing. Instead of lumbering the sector with restrictive targets that it is never going to achieve (at least not with the paltry support it is given), perhaps wannabe MPs could focus on incremental changes that would make a tangible difference.
Reducing the red tape around woodland creation schemes? Let's do it. Ensuring the Forestry Commission is suitably funded and staffed to process paperwork in a timely manner? Yes, please. Putting the focus on tree establishment rather than planting? Sign us up.
Shame none of these fit nicely onto a leaflet.
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