“People don't want to swim in diluted sewage”

Tony Juniper believes that nature’s recovery depends on joined-up action

- ANDREW GRIFFITHS

It is a sunny August morning and Tony Juniper CBE, chair of Natural England, is standing beside a beaver created wetland on the River Otter in Devon. He is there to announce a consultation on the release of beavers into the wild, and to reveal that the animal is to be given legal protection as a native species – a status so rudely interrupted here some 400 years ago when it was hunted to extinction.

The River Otter hosted a five-year research project investigating the impact of the beavers’ return to our rivers. The project received very little financial support from government at its outset in 2015, but ended as Defra’s flagship example of species reintroduction. Five years can be a long time in conservation politics.

On a pause between press interviews, Juniper suddenly sees an unexpected bird flying around. He knows instantly what it is: a peach-faced lovebird. How is he so certain? Well, not only has Juniper been one of our better-known environmental campaigners, he is also an expert on parrots. The bird, probably a fugitive from a private collection, adds a pleasingly surreal quality to proceedings. Juniper takes to Twitter: “A touch of Zambia in Devon!”