Dr. Liam Lysaght:

The Chairman mentioned the challenges in agriculture. How it is done is a different question, but what needs to be done is that each farmer should identify what resources or aspects of his or her farm and farming practice are beneficial to biodiversity. Many farmers do not have the training on biodiversity to be able to do that. As an absolute minimum, we should look at current resources and what good practices are taking place, and ensure we retain them. They should not get worse. That should be an absolute requirement.

We must look at what policies and incentives can be put in place to achieve that and make it happen. A good case in point, to which I keep coming back, and one that is symptomatic of how poorly we manage our biodiversity is hedgerows across the countryside. They are often managed as poorly as they can be in respect of biodiversity. They are the types of things in respect of which, if we just eased back with a small bit of management and did something more sympathetic, the benefits would be enormous. It is soul-destroying that we cannot even achieve that. The same applies for roadside hedges.

When talking about the champion for biodiversity within the public sector, it is important to state that climate action is going to benefit biodiversity. There is no doubt about that. However, if we do not take action specifically for biodivesity, all the climate action in the world may not actually benefit biodiversity. It is quite a nuanced issue. The reason I am talking about a champion for biodiversity within the public sector is that it is cross-sectorial. All sectors and aspects of society have to at least do a small bit to help benefit biodiversity. It is a cross-cutting initiative. We need someone at a high level to try to bring it up the political ladder and play an overarching co-ordination role. That is perhaps what is missing. This committee could be extended or there could be a committee on biodiversity. Many of the discussions we had today have shown that there are plenty of solutions to this. We know what the solutions are; the issue is how we achieve them and make them happen.