Daniel Zeichner, MP for Cambridge, led a debate on “restoring nature to prevent climate breakdown“ in Parliament on Monday 28th October, highlighting Cambridge as at the cutting edge of innovation to protect the environment.

The debate on a parliamentary petition calling for the Government to “Restore nature on a massive scale to help stop climate breakdown“ was granted after around 110,000 people signed the petition, with over 650 from Cambridge.

Mr Zeichner told MPs: “There are some wonderful long-term projects such as the National Trust’s visionary project to restore wetlands around Wicken Fen in Cambridgeshire… That project has been ably promoted over many years by Tony Juniper, who now chairs Natural England. He is a highly regarded environmentalist. I will mention in passing that he was my Green party opponent in the 2010 general election in Cambridge!

“The Wicken Fen rewilding project told me the project has a 100-year plan to extend the nature reserve by 10 miles… While Wicken Fen may be looking 100 years ahead, I am not sure Parliament can look forward 100 hours at the moment, but we do need to commit to long-term natural restoration.”

The Cambridge MP spoke about work being done at the world-leading David Attenborough Building which he described as: “a conservation campus that is home to organisations that promote the natural world, such as the RSPB, Flora & Fauna International and BirdLife International.” He also covered the importance pressed upon him by the Cambridge Conservation Initiative and others of evidence-led work, data gathering and analysis, and ambitious Government targets.

Afterwards, Mr Zeichner said: “I’m glad Parliament got a chance to debate this important issue today. With the school climate strikes, the Extinction Rebellion protests, and many more related campaigns, it’s clear that ‘stopping climate breakdown’ is at the top of the agenda for many, many people. Last week I received a letter from a 10-year old girl in Cambridge who asked me to “tell the government that they need to act now and my question for the government is: do you want to keep ruining animals’ lives, or do you want to save the animals and our world from climate change?” – I hope that they hear and rise up to this challenge.“