Decision - Biodiversity Habitat Bank Pilot at St Michaels Field

Brighton and Hove Cabinet Decided 22 Jan 2026 · effective 31 Jan 2026 approved Key decision GET /api/coverage

Decision maker

Cabinet

Report author

James Woodward

Published

23 Jan 2026

Reference

7564

As published

the council's own words, unedited

This report seeks Cabinet approval to: register St Michaels Field as a habitat bank for the purpose of selling biodiversity units and credits; enter into the necessary legal agreement for this purpose; and have delegated authority for key decisions on the registration and sale of units and credits.

1) Cabinet agrees to register St Michael's Field as a Habitat Bank and enter the necessary legal agreement for the registration of the site. 2) Cabinet delegates authority to the Corporate Director for Finance & Property and the Corporate Director for City Operations for key decisions on registration and sale of biodiversity units and credits.

Parsed from the document

gpt-5.6-luna-2026-07-09 · 5811/1610 tokens · 12916ms · parsed 8 Sep 2026 11:38

Everything below was read out of a PDF by a model It is useful and it is not authoritative. The document it came from is linked in the rail, and where the two disagree the document is right.

The report seeks approval to register St Michael’s Field as a habitat bank for selling Biodiversity Net Gain units and Voluntary Biodiversity credits. Brighton & Hove City Council expects the scheme to generate income to fund habitat management and staff costs over 30 years while supporting biodiversity objectives.

Recommendation

Cabinet agrees to register St Michael’s Field as a Habitat Bank and enter the necessary legal agreement for registration, and delegates authority to the Corporate Director for Finance & Property and the Corporate Director for City Operations for key decisions on registration and sale of biodiversity units and credits.

Financial impact

Initial registration, Section 106 and hedgerow planting costs of £50,000; income from selling units and credits is expected to fund costs over the 30-year management period and deliver council revenue savings.

Ward affected

Patcham & Hollingbury

Decision maker

Cabinet

Date in document

22 Jan 2026

Stakeholders named

parsed

Brighton & Hove City CouncilDownland Advisory Panelthe neighbouring farm business and tenant of Brighton & Hove City Councilthe neighbouring Traveller community of St Michael’s Way Traveller Sitelocal residents and visitorsdevelopers and corporates purchasing biodiversity units or creditslocal farmerslocal consultant ecologistsNatural EnglandSouth Downs National Park Authority

Next steps

parsed

Enter into a Section 106 legal agreement with South Downs National Park Authority.
Register the site with Natural England.
Set up financial governance for income and expenditure.
Include the contribution towards relevant staff time in the council’s Medium-Term Financial Strategy.
Commence establishment of the prescribed habitat management.
Begin selling biodiversity units and credits.
Finalise the Habitat Management & Monitoring Plan after the Cabinet decision.

Precedents

not built

"Decided elsewhere" is not built Finding the same decision in other councils needs semantic matching over decision text, which is part of the search rewrite. Until then, the council's own decisions list is the way through.