Mary Creagh
MP for Coventry East · Labour · United Kingdom
“The actions taken by this Government stand in stark contrast to the actions of previous Conservative Governments, who were happy to watch the closure of the Massey Ferguson factory, the Alvis tank factory and Peugeot in Coventry in the ’80s, which led to 20% unemployment in the city where I grew up.”
“I welcome the Lord Chancellor to his place and congratulate him on the steps he has taken this summer to reduce prison populations while excluding the most dangerous offenders. We must never again be in the position of having more prisoners than prison places.”
“Under this Government, more than £100 billion of private investment in the net zero economy has been announced. We have done much on mitigation. However, following advice from the Climate Change Committee, we are setting stronger objectives for climate adaptation.”
“Since we have come into government, approximately 10,000 hectares of peatlands have been brought into restoration through our nature for climate peatland grant scheme. Last week we announced £44 million for lowland peat—which I do not think the hon.”
“The hon. Member asked about a range of policies. I will talk about natural flood management. We will invest £300 million in natural flood management over the next 10 years—the highest ever figure for floods programming, and that is the minimum level.”
“I remember when I was Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee doing an inquiry into heatwaves that started during the “beast from the east”, so nobody gave us any evidence, and ended on the first 36° June day in London, which I think was back in 2017 or 2018. The point my hon. Friend makes is a valid one.”
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“Friend the Energy Secretary said in his statement last year, “We have been at our best in the House when we have worked across parties on these issues.” —[ Official Report , 14 July 2025; Vol. 771, c. 31.] By preparing our country and our citizens for the climate and nature crises, we are showing leadership internationally. This Government are acting now to protect the world in which we live, which we pass on to future generations. I commend this statement to the House.”
“This week, I am visiting the Great North Bog to see successful peatland restoration in action, and later in the week I will celebrate the 75th anniversary of the first four national parks—a legacy of the great 1945 Labour Government. Tomorrow, we launch a competition for young people to join our new youth climate and nature panel. These young people will offer their expert insight to Government as we deliver for climate and nature action through outreach. From introducing wild beavers to planting three new national forests and creating nine new river walks, this Labour Government are bringing nature closer to people. We will all benefit from a more resilient, more prosperous and greener country. As my right hon.”
“The Ministry of Defence is developing climate security analysis and critical emerging technologies to support energy resilience for the UK and our armed forces. The Department for Education is investing £710 million out to 2030 to improve the condition of school and college buildings, reducing their emissions and bills, and increasing their resilience to climate change so that they last for decades to come. I am delighted that in my constituency of Coventry East, Richard Lee primary school and Potters Green primary school are installing new solar panels. At Courthouse Green school, I opened a sensory garden built by the pupils’ eco team to bring nature closer to children.”
“Today, we are publishing the 30 by 30 delivery plan for land in England and guidance to land managers on how to implement it. In May, we announced the £30 million wildlife-rich habitat fund, and today we are providing an additional £37 million a year for the next three years for national parks and national landscapes. This is a whole-of-Government effort. This weekend, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office ratified the biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction agreement to create marine protected areas on the high seas, covering nearly two thirds of the world’s oceans. Funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, the Advanced Research and Invention Agency is investing £81 million in its forecasting tipping points programme.”
“Every species saved reduces the risk of losses to the ecosystems we rely on—pollination, disease prevention, and food and climate regulation. The key to delivering our nature and climate goals is how we use our land and seas. Our land use framework shows that we have enough land to achieve our priorities across economic growth, housing, food production, climate and nature recovery. However, we must make better decisions about how we use our land. We are moving from paper-based systems to making land digital and opening up the Land Registry free for all. Today, we have published an interactive story map of our spatial evidence to support decision makers to use their land more effectively. The UK has also committed to protect and conserve 30% of our land and seas for nature by 2030.”
“Under this Government, more than £100 billion of private investment in the net zero economy has been announced. We have done much on mitigation. However, following advice from the Climate Change Committee, we are setting stronger objectives for climate adaptation. We are building our resilience for a minimum of 2° of warming by 2050 and supporting combined authorities to increase their resilience to climate change, too. In 2024, we saw a single year exceed 1.5° of warming, which is why we are committed to working with our domestic and international partners to keep the Paris agreement goal of limiting temperatures to a rise of 1.5°C. Global warming is likely to reach 1.5° in around 2030, but 1.5° is and will remain the right limit. Every fraction of a degree of warming reduces the severity of impacts on people and nature worldwide.”
“We have invested a record £2.65 billion in flood resilience, invested in new food waste collection services and invested £1 billion in our national biosecurity infrastructure in Weybridge. Over the next three years, we will invest more than £7 billion in nature—the largest investment in nature ever. That includes £5.9 billion for environmental farming schemes, £816 million for tree planting and £85 million for peatland restoration. Last October, we published the carbon budget and growth delivery plan to set out how the UK will continue to reduce emissions in order to lower bills for consumers and secure good jobs for British people. Last month, the majority of Members in this place voted to cut emissions by almost 87% from 1990 levels for the carbon budget 7 period, which runs from 2038 to 2042.”
“That is why this Labour Government are stepping up, leading globally on nature recovery, climate mitigation and adaptation. In the UK, we are working in partnership with local communities, businesses, conservationists and farmers. Before the Paris agreement, the world was on track for around 4° of warming; now, national commitments put us on course for around 2.5° degrees. There is so much more to do, but this represents real progress. In December, we launched our environmental improvement plan, which, for the first time, set out delivery plans to underpin our targets to restore nature, boost our recycling rates and protect our environmental security. Since then, we have published the land use framework, the water White Paper and the farming road map.”
“Our nature security assessment published in January shows that if the current rate of biodiversity loss continues, every critical ecosystem is on a pathway to collapse, from the coral reefs that protect our coastlines to the peatlands that store carbon and prevent floods. The UK’s climate is getting hotter and wetter, with more extreme events—2025 was the UK’s hottest year since records began. In the heatwaves in May and June this year, the Met Office reported that as many as 2,700 people may have died, railway tracks buckled, over 1,000 schools closed, and the London ambulance service had its busiest day on record. Since 1901, the UK’s sea level has risen by about 20 cm, but that rate is accelerating, because two thirds of this rise has happened in just the last 30 years.”
“With permission, I would like to make a statement about the nature and climate crisis. Nature is the monopoly provider of everything we need to live. We are living through the Anthropocene, an age where human activity is now the dominant influence on our planet’s climate and ecosystems. We are seeing its consequences: pollution, climate change and mass extinction. Last year, the Energy Secretary gave the first ever statement to this House on the crisis. One year on, I am here to set out the Government’s commitment to tackle those challenges. Climate change drives nature loss, and nature loss drives climate change. We must tackle both. Droughts and floods are disrupting harvests, straining supply chains, and pushing up costs.”
“Wetter, healthy and functioning peatlands are much more resilient to the impacts of wildfire. We have published our farming road map, and through the new environmental land management schemes, we are supporting smaller farmers—those organic farmers that were excluded from the larger schemes that the hon. Gentleman talked about. We are spatially targeting, so that we get bigger, better and more joined-up protected areas for nature and wildlife.”
“Since we have come into government, approximately 10,000 hectares of peatlands have been brought into restoration through our nature for climate peatland grant scheme. Last week we announced £44 million for lowland peat—which I do not think the hon. Gentleman’s Government invested in—and we expect another 4,000 hectares to be restored this year. We have the target, which his Government set, to restore an additional 40,000 hectares by 2030. Rotational burning is a contributory factor to 80% of peatlands being degraded. It makes it difficult to restore peat to its natural hydrology and impossible to return it to its natural state. It is also really bad for air quality locally. It damages peatlands, shifts species composition, disrupts the hydrology of peat and, crucially, releases stored carbon, increasing vulnerability to wildfire.”
“Fragmented site-by-site environmental requirements and increasing costs were adding to the delays to the much-needed housing and infrastructure that this country needs. It was not working for nature either, and the condition of many of our most important habitats and species was continuing to decline. The nature restoration fund will support development and ensure that the money spent by developers on environmental mitigation delivers more. It is a simple levy payment that Natural England will use to deliver impactful conservation measures at scale instead of having a piecemeal approach. Let me talk a little about peat. Some 80% of England’s peatlands are degraded. We are investing £85 million in their restoration by 2030.”
“I am disappointed by the nature and tone of the hon. Gentleman’s response to our attempts to right some of the wrongs left behind by the previous Government. The hon. Gentleman asked in particular about the Planning and Infrastructure Act. What we have done through that Act is introduce strategic policy statements to prioritise outcomes over process, so that Natural England and the Environment Agency can speed up decision making while maintaining high environmental standards. We have given them £100 million over three years to fund specialist staff and modern digital systems to cut costly delays for planners. It was clear when we came into government that the status quo for development and nature was simply not working.”
“We are committed to an ambitious fourth national adaptation programme in 2028. I have requested advice from the Climate Change Committee on appropriate planning assumptions to inform our approach, but we are investing in those flood defences through £104 billion in private investment for new water infrastructure and, crucially, the launch of the local authority climate service to support local authorities to respond to flooding and, now, heatwaves.”
“Through some of our landscape recovery projects we are seeing farm clusters get behind the new idea of leveraging in private finance to work alongside public investment, but it is also about understanding their role in a multifunctional and multi-use landscape. In the uplands in the Lake district, for example, it is about working to restore peat so that it can hold much more water in the land to prevent run-off, which can overwhelm the towns and villages below the peatlands and the bogs. We understand the role that nature can play in protecting run-off from farms—particularly agricultural run-off—so it may be a case of, for example, planting trees along river banks and ensuring that there is no run-off into the rivers, reducing their phosphate. My hon. Friend asked me about the national adaptation plan.”
“We are acutely aware of the challenges that farmers face from extreme weather events. In some areas in the east of England, the wheat harvest is already being brought in. We are committed to maintaining food production and supporting thriving farm businesses. But, as I said earlier, land managers and farmers have an increasingly important role in reducing the risk of flooding and coastal erosion as we adapt to climate changes, and eligibility criteria for natural flood management funding has widened to include them for the first time. We want them to do more on soils, so that they can hold the water as well, buffer strips, to slow the flow, and run-off attenuation features to store and release water.”
“The hon. Member asked about a range of policies. I will talk about natural flood management. We will invest £300 million in natural flood management over the next 10 years—the highest ever figure for floods programming, and that is the minimum level. We will be supporting projects that reduce flood risk and deliver wider benefits to communities and nature. On the concrete flood barriers and dried rivers that the hon. Gentleman spoke about, we must do more to enable farmers to hold water in their land. When they are building their reservoirs, we do not want concrete bowls or buckets; what we need are natural scrapes and areas where they can hold on to water. They can help with that natural aspiration by planting trees and experimenting with agroforestry, as we are doing with the western forest around Bristol and Gloucester.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for her question. It was clear at London climate action week that the energy and climate transition is already well under way. With the British Standards Institution, we have worked to set nature standards so that when nature projects and large financial funds want to invest in nature, they have the confidence to do so and are not accused of greenwashing as they have been in the past. We also want to learn from some of the issues about investing in carbon markets so that companies feel comfortable insetting carbon and nature losses in their own supply chains, where the first rule is to do no harm. A huge amount of money is going into nature projects and I am excited to see how that will develop in the future.”
“I was discussing that very issue with Natural England this morning. Land covering about 32% of England is already likely to, or has the potential to, contribute to the 30 by 30 target, including through our landscape recovery projects, and local nature reserves and national nature reserves. We are creating 3,000 hectares a year of national nature reserves, which makes a very significant contribution to that. We have also set out the route to 30 by 30, talking about bronze, silver and gold land. I understand why the ENGOs want everything to be gold, but we must live in the real world and show what the pipeline towards gold looks like.”
“My hon. Friend is right: we have an army of citizen scientists and naturalists, and we are certainly looking forward to celebrating some of them tomorrow at RHS Garden Wisley for Bees’ Needs Week. We also have the pollinator count next week. However, anyone who wants to clean up their river needs a permit from the Environment Agency beforehand. as we have habitats and flood defences there. My hon. Friend is right that we should empower citizens to take action but they need to do so without there being unintended consequences.”
“The hon. Member knows that I am unable to comment on individual licences and that the Energy Secretary will make his decision in due course. What I would say it is that it is essential that we have a climate transition that is fair to those workers in the North sea. North sea oil and gas have been in decline for about the last 20 years, so he is right to say that, and we have to get off the fossil fuel rollercoaster to secure energy security and prices for the future.”
“The Water Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy), is only too happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss bottom trawling. I believe that about 32% of our waters are currently protected. My understanding is that this depends on the site that is protected and the particular feature, animal or creature that is found there—it is about getting the appropriate protection for the appropriate thing. I will get the Water Minister to talk to her in detail about this matter. [ Official Report , 16 July 2026; Vol. 789, c. 16WC.] (Correction)”
“By publishing that incineration capacity strategy, we set out clearly the standards that we are looking for on new incineration permits. We have a problem—an epidemic—with abandoned landfills left behind by the previous Government and illegal landfills that are springing up because of organised crime groups across the country. It is infinitely better to use energy from waste plants than to bury waste in a hole next to where people work, live and go to school. There is an issue with the sustainability of incineration, but it is part of our clean power as we go forward.”
“We need to look at whether the shrubs we have are appropriate for the intense heatwaves we are having, and if not, ask what needs to change.”
“I remember when I was Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee doing an inquiry into heatwaves that started during the “beast from the east”, so nobody gave us any evidence, and ended on the first 36° June day in London, which I think was back in 2017 or 2018. The point my hon. Friend makes is a valid one. I am incredibly sorry to hear about the impact that that fire has had on her constituents, and I am sure it has had huge impacts on the local fire and rescue services as well. What we need to do in local government is to plan for these mutual assistance moments, because there was also a fire in Stratford—last week, I think—and people had to be evacuated from the train track. Network Rail is taking action on the clearance of trees to ensure that the line is clear, and it has created new areas of grassland.”
“The North Sea Transition Authority is equipped to support a fair, managed and prosperous transition, including through a new statutory objective to consider workers, communities and supply chains in its decisions, and we are extending employment rights and protections for offshore workers in renewables, bringing them into line with those working in oil and gas. We have a pragmatic plan for the North sea to secure and renew the basin’s place as Britain’s powerhouse, protecting jobs in our oil and gas heartlands, and to build the next generation of good jobs in clean energy industries. Beyond that, I am afraid I cannot say much more.”
“My hon. Friend is right to say that we have seen a big flip-flop from the Conservatives. I am old enough to remember when, back in 2019, they put net zero into law under Theresa May and she described it as a Conservative mission. Now their leader says that the very same target is “impossible”, so which Conservative party are the voters supposed to believe: the one that legislated for net zero or the one that now instructs its MPs to vote against it?”
“I mentioned in my statement the solar panels for schools, which have had the benefit of cutting bills and providing a resilient electricity supply for those schools. The DFE is investing £710 million to improve the condition of school and college buildings and, crucially, they are part of our Government estate nature plan, so they are part of that cross-Government work. Schools cover a land mass the size of Birmingham, and they need to play their part in educating pupils about the climate and nature crisis and in helping to tackle it.”
“I always like to go and see trees being planted, and my hon. Friend is right to talk about the importance of trees, both for shading our streets and as part of the three new national forests, two of which we have already announced. That is why we have more than doubled the grant for trees outside woodland through the Tree Council. It has gone up from £1 million in the last financial year to £2.5 million this year. Crucially, however, we need the right trees in the right place for the right reason, and the trees that will survive to 2100 are not the same trees that our mums and dads were planting in our back gardens.”
“The depleted numbers on the Conservative Benches are beginning to make me wonder whether they need some funding to avoid extinction— [ Laughter. ] I’m here all week! Local nature recovery strategies have been a brilliant vehicle to get these better, bigger, more joined-up landscapes, and I have been in discussion with officials in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs about how we can align and spatially target funding towards those areas in particular. I have been talking about exactly that with the West Midlands combined authority.”
“I look after many things, but sadly I do not yet control the broadcast schedules of any national broadcasters. The point of the National Emergency Briefing is to get people together, a bit like the great organisation that rejoices in the name of People Planet Pint. I have been people, planet and football for most of the last three weeks, but bringing people together to discuss these issues in local areas is a really positive way for people to grab this crisis by the neck and set out what they are going to do locally.”
“We have the biodiversity net gain framework, which is all about making sure that there is a biodiversity uplift of 10% in every planning policy. It was a brand-new policy left to us by the previous Government, but it was not working perfectly—nothing is born perfect—so we have made some changes to make it more proportionate and ensure that it works better in practice.”
“Again, my hon. Friend tempts me beyond my brief. Given that most local authorities have declared a climate and nature crisis, it strikes me that her suggestion is an excellent topic for the Youth Parliament—or local youth panels could be organised through schools.”
“The climate security taskforce is part of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s remit, so I can ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero to talk to my hon. Friend about that. The report that he mentions says that analysis shows there is “high confidence” that “ecosystem degradation is occurring across all regions. Every critical ecosystem is on a pathway to collapse.” It goes on: “Global ecosystem degradation and collapse threaten UK national security and prosperity…Without major intervention…this is highly likely to continue to 2050 and beyond.” So what is already in the public domain makes for sobering reading, and I commend the full document, which is in the public domain, to all hon. Members.”
“Given the intense heatwaves that we have experienced this year and in previous years, it is vital that children in Ashford have the protection of shade from trees. Academy trusts should be making funds available for adaptation, to mitigate impacts in their schools, and to keep their schools open. We do not want children at home, not learning, and schools overheating to absolutely impossible temperatures. I commend those students, and I encourage them in their efforts.”
“We are having a triple-COP year. We will be setting out our approach and our achievements as we move towards the biodiversity COP in Armenia and the climate COP in Turkey. There is also an important desertification COP taking place in Mongolia, which is on the frontline of the climate crisis as the permafrost there collapses. We are looking to ensure that every £1 we invest in climate also delivers for nature, because the era of £1 for one thing and £1 for another thing and Governments being asked to do this on their own is emphatically over.”
“We are building nine new reservoirs, but further to what my hon. Friend says, I have had messages from Severn Trent Water, who advise me to put a bucket in the bath, get a hosepipe, and do a bit of siphoning of the bathwater to water the garden. There are already three areas with hosepipe bans, and I fear that there may be more bans on the way.”
“I will be travelling to Fylingdales this week to make an announcement about what we are doing to help those brave farmers who are on the frontline of that wildfire.”
“As I mentioned before, we are more than doubling the funding for tree planting through the trees outside woodland fund. Climate change is sexist: it seems to be that women are particularly affected, and because of our body composition, we are less able to reduce our core heat, so we need to look at specific policies to protect particular members of the community, including the under-fives, the over-65s and those with heart and lung problems. We look to our health service to do that, but it cannot do that if the hospitals are heating up beyond 28°C.”
“I pay tribute to everyone who is helping with the restocking. My hon. Friend is lucky to have a river so close to London that has such a sensitive and rare species as the European eel in it. It is important that perpetrators of environmental crimes are brought to justice swiftly, but it is also important that any case that we bring is watertight and achieves the right outcomes.”
“We know that we need to experiment with agroforestry, and that we need to do farming differently in this country, but sometimes it is about going back to the old ways of farming, with mixed arable crops and cattle and sheep, to get back that grassland; and about re-wiggling the waters. I was talking today about the blocking up of a little river in East Anglia for blackcurrant bushes—we all grew up on Ribena. That is resilient farming—growing our own fruit, and not relying on Spain for our fruit and veg, because if Spain’s water supply dries up, we will have to do more at home.”
“My hon. Friend lives in a particularly beautiful part of the world that has a lot to commend it. We need to take a whole-city approach to the issue. We need to look at our roads. We need to reduce the urban heat island effect, with more tree planting and soft planting, and moving away from the grey concrete. We need more planting that will hold water out of our drains and keep it on our streets. We need to reduce the concreting over of front gardens, which has done so much to contribute towards flooding problems.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise the subject of peatlands and their role in hydrological protection. He raises the same point as the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) did about Calderdale, but from a completely different direction. We know that peatlands have this important role to play. They are this country’s Amazon rainforest, and we are doing everything we can to protect them for the future.”
“My hon. Friend’s year 2s at St Michael’s show that you are never too young to start caring about the environment, but it is important that we nurture and protect that climate awareness and eco awareness. Often as kids go into secondary school, they can lose that. I am excited that we will have a new GCSE in natural history, so that children can learn about what they love—again, that is something being done under this Government, not the last.”
“I commend my hon. Friend on getting through that quickly. She tempts me to go beyond my brief, and on to the subject of battery and solar energy. Solar installations can result in biodiversity net gains of up to 300%; there can be farmland, sheep-grazing grassland and solar alongside each other, and that can provide extra income for the farmer. On battery energy storage, I feel like that is a question for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero.”
“My hon. Friend asks a great question. I said earlier that climate change is sexist; it also hits the poorest harder—a point he makes well. As we look towards the future, as well as thinking about offering warm spaces through our local government colleagues and councils, we also need to start looking at offering cool and air-conditioned places, such as this Chamber, where we can all go for a bit of relief from the heat.”
“Since publishing the waste crime action plan in March, we have started clearing illegal waste at Kidlington, and we are investigating clearing up sites in Wigan, Sheffield and Hyndburn. We have arrested 18 waste criminals, launched the digital waste tracking scheme, so that we can see where the waste goes in near real time, and this week we approved legislation for tougher powers to tackle rogue criminals. We have 300,000 people registered to transport waste in this country, but not all of them are legit.”
“My hon. Friend is right that, under the previous Government, there was a large amount of illegally dumped waste—about 30,000 tonnes between 2018 and 2022. Enforcement action is being taken by Medway council through a planning enforcement notice, using planning powers to remove the existing illegal businesses, and the EA will be serving an enforcement notice on the landowner to remove the waste. The difference between this Government and the last is that we are taking action. If people spot waste crime taking place, they should call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.”
“The hon. Member is absolutely right that fly-tippers are despoiling our countryside, and I pay tribute to his local group for taking such great action to keep the beaches and countryside clean. We have introduced a penalty of up to nine points on fly-tippers’ driving licences. Often these people are just doing a job for mates at the weekend, and if they could lose their driving licence, it will certainly make them think twice about doing such jobs. However, fly-tippers are often part of a much wider serious and organised crime group. We should not think of them as little criminals, because they can often be part of quite a big criminal gang.”