Natural Environment and Rural Communities Bill

We principally envisage that the commission will be able to draw on work by the research councils. Within its budget, it may have scope to do some analysis, examination and research of its own. The Department has funded research and will continue to find ways to do so, not least to provide evidence of, and a database on, what is happening in rural communities. The lack of such a database was a severe handicap in trying to implement the rural White Paper.