CEN: Reeves’ cut to farming budget risks nature recovery

[11/06/25] Responding to the Spending Review, CEN’s Director, Sam Hall, said: 

“Given the government’s cuts to nature schemes like biodiversity net gain and the water restoration fund, increased spending for nature was welcome, albeit overdue.

“However, there remain significant questions about the farming budget. Although funding for the Environmental Land Management schemes (ELMs) has increased, this increase is entirely due to the phasing out of the EU legacy subsidy scheme for farmers. 

“Farmers steward 70% of our land. We simply can’t restore nature without incentivising farmers - both large and small - to adopt more sustainable practices. But with some of the legacy EU subsidies now not going into ELMs, the overall farming budget is set to be cut. This will leave some farmers unable to access the schemes, putting nature recovery and farm businesses at risk.

“More generally, the Chancellor’s spending splurge has heaped yet more pressure on the public finances. She had remarkably little to say about how she would make public spending on the environment go further. There need to be commitments to cut red tape for green infrastructure, to enable farmers to enhance nature more affordably. The overall reliance on public spending is a high-stakes gamble that could backfire on the government and the environment. The government must look to leverage more funding for nature and beyond from the private sector."