The Environment (Principles, Governance and Biodiversity Targets) (Wales) Bill was introduced into the Senedd on Monday 2 June 2025.
This page compiles key Senedd Research publications to support scrutiny of the Bill. It will be updated as the Bill makes its way through the Senedd’s legislative process.
You can follow the Bill’s progress on the Environment (Principles, Governance and Biodiversity Targets) (Wales) Bill webpage. This includes the Bill itself and the Explanatory Memorandum, which includes Explanatory Notes and a Regulatory Impact Assessment.
Senedd Research publications on the Bill
- Senedd Research Bilingual Glossary. Provides a list of technical and novel terms used in the Bill. It is intended to support bilingual scrutiny.
Senedd Research publications providing background reading
- Senedd Research briefing: Biodiversity targets and environmental principles. Gives a background to policy matters within the Bill, examining the White Paper proposals on targets and principles, and providing comparison with arrangements in other UK nations (19 May 2025).
- Senedd Research briefing: Establishing an environmental governance body: a comparative analysis. A comparison of the Welsh White Paper proposals for an environmental governance body with what’s happening elsewhere in the UK (2 May 2025).
- Senedd Research article: The nature emergency: halting biodiversity loss by 2030 will be an “extraordinary challenge”. Scrutiny of the Welsh Government’s progress in tackling nature loss ahead of a on the (17 April 2025).
- Senedd Research article: COP16: Biodiversity from Cali to Cymru. An article on what was agreed at COP16 and Wales’s progress towards meeting the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) agreed at COP15 (5 December 2024).
- Senedd Research article: Next steps on the path to nature recovery. A summary of the Environmental Principals, Governance and Biodiversity Targets White Paper, including comments from stakeholders (1 July 2024).
- Senedd Research article: “Time is rapidly running out” for the Welsh Government to establish an environmental watchdog. A recap of environmental governance arrangements in Wales, following the CCEI Committee raising concerns about the interim measures. (23 November 2023).
- Senedd Research briefing: Environmental governance in the UK provides a background on the EU’s system of environmental governance (20 November 2023).
- Senedd Research briefing: Biodiversity 2023. An overview of the state of Welsh biodiversity, policies to protect it, and what additional action stakeholders would like to see (10 November 2023).
- Senedd Research article: COP15: what’s been agreed, and what it means for Wales. A summary COP15’s outcomes, most notably the GBF agreement (9 January 2023).
- Senedd Research article: The environmental governance gap: how robust are the interim measures? A look into the functioning of the interim environmental governance measures (29 November 2022).
Article by Dr Matthew Sutton and Dr Katy Orford, Senedd Research, Welsh Parliament
