Haweswater showcases green policy outcomes

United Utilities and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds have showcased their decade long partnership work at Haweswater Reservoir as an exemplar for government green policy outcomes.

The quality and condition of the land around the reservoir, which serves a quarter of the North West region, directly affects raw water quality. United Utilities and the RSPB have been working to return the land to a more natural state, drawing on funding from a range of different sources. This has included the re-meandering of Swindale Beck (pictured).

The partners said this has resulted in many benefits including landscape and nature restoration, carbon capture, reducing downstream flood risk, sustainable livestock production and access improvements. They added that the project:

• provides a template for how land can be better managed in England’s National Parks;

• demonstrates practical steps to achieving the changes required by the new Environment Act on improving air and water quality, halting the decline of species and improving the natural environment; and

• demonstrates how new funding mechanisms can support the rural economy instead of traditional agricultural subsidies.

Lord Benyon, minister for rural affairs, access to nature and biosecurity, visited Haweswater to learn more about the scheme last week.