The Link Blog is a space for members, and others, to express their views about the natural environment.
It includes our 
year plan and Agriculture Bill 
series, as well as our Blueprint for Water focused blogs.
If you would like to contribute a blog, please contact Emma Adler..
Published on: 2 March 2016
Dealing with invasive species at our places costs the National Trust thousands of pounds every year. As a conservation charity looking after 250,000 hectares of countryside and hundreds of ponds, lakes and rivers, we’re very aware of the impact of invasive species on native wildlife. We’ve joined the call, led by Wildlife and Countryside Link, for the UK government to do more to work with other EU countries to tighten up existing regulations to prevent invasive species reaching our shores.
Read More...Published on: 2 March 2016
Britain’s wildlife really is under constant threat from invasive non-native species reaching our shores. It costs our economy more than £2bn per year to hold them at bay. Wetlands are particularly vulnerable because invasive non-native species can outcompete our native wildlife and starve them of space, oxygen and food.
Read More...Published on: 29 February 2016
Sometimes it can be hard to see how 'environmental issues' affect our day to day lives. They can be tricky to relate to and understand, making it difficult for you to care about them. So, you may be amazed to find out that having the invasive non-native species Japanese Knotweed, a fairly well known culprit, in your garden can actually affect the value of your house and could impede the sale of your property.
Read More...Published on: 19 February 2016
On 18 February, new River Basin Management Plans were published to protect and improve water quality. These plans are part of a European framework for the environment, setting ambitious targets for cleaning up our water so it’s better for wildlife and clean and safe for people. Yet UK Government plans will result in only a 3% improvement in the next five years, leaving us languishing behind other EU countries in achieving goals for cleaning up our water.
Read More...Published on: 2 February 2016
Please enjoy World Wetlands Day - go find a frog, dig a pond, or romp in a bog. Together, let’s use the day to remind ourselves, our international partners and our own politicians that - manage the water right - and we really are better off wetter. It’s a day to celebrate a successful international environmental agreement: the Convention on Wetlands, signed 45 years ago in the Iranian city of Ramsar on the shores of the Caspian Sea. This year, we mark the importance of wetlands for livelihoods.
Read More...Published on: 29 January 2016
While not everyone in the environment sector has heard of the Joint Nature Conservation Committee – known as the JNCC – they will definitely have benefited from it. The JNCC is the public body that advises the UK Government and devolved administrations on UK-wide and international nature conservation. At the same time, it provides a wide range of services that benefit NGOs across the UK in their collective efforts to secure the recovery and protection of the natural environment.
Read More...Published on: 17 January 2016
Wildlife and Countryside Link’s Marine Working Group has been campaigning for a network of Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs) for 15 years. First we ran an intense campaign to secure the legislation needed in the form of the UK Marine Act 2009. And since then we have been campaigning and lobbying to get the MCZs designated and ultimately well managed.
Read More...Published on: 12 January 2016
In November 2015, the Government laid before Parliament a report that you may have missed. No fanfare, no announcements, not a sniff of media coverage. The report sets out progress in delivering marine planning in English waters, six years since the Marine and Coastal Access Act came into force. Given that the marine environment has had no system of strategic planning at all, this is kind of a big deal (for some of us!)
Read More...Published on: 22 December 2015
The UK has always enjoyed a respected track-record when it comes to consulting the public. Up until five years ago, the case for legislative proposals (and amendments) would be supported by statistical data, an informed narrative, or both. You may have noticed that consultation periods are now considerably shorter (and sometimes dispensed with altogether), but perhaps more worryingly, there appears to be an emerging trend for far-reaching and detrimental change to be advanced in the absence of seemingly any evidential basis.
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