Member

It is an heroic assumption to assume that Natural England will be able to deliver mitigation more efficiently than a competitive, healthy private sector, given the monopolistic nature of the state-owned mechanism for charging and the speed at which its large bureaucracy creeps ahead. With its obvious conflicts of interest, how is Natural England going to kite-mark private proposals? Success does not look like only Natural England schemes having some sort of kite-mark accreditation, or Natural England uniquely having an engineered first-mover advantage. What protections would private operators have against predatory pricing or the loading of legal, contract or inspection costs on to innovative solutions by Natural England, with the only opportunity for private business being to appeal against the organisation that is eating their lunch?