The Countryside Alliance has successfully pushed Natural England to enforce the law on ragwort by reopening its complaints procedure from 1 April 2026.

It was the Alliance which raised the alarm about Natural England having stopped accepting or dealing with any new complaints about harmful weeds back in September, despite being the body responsible for enforcing the Weeds Act 1959 in England. The Act was passed to prevent the spread of ‘injurious’ weeds, the best known being ragwort, which is toxic to humans and poisonous to grazing animals including cattle and horses. The Weeds Act allows owners of land at risk of weed spread from neighbouring areas to insist that it be controlled at source, but only after an enforcement action by Natural England.

We were alerted to this situation by Wiltshire farmer and Countryside Alliance member Christopher Jenkin, who was affected by spread from a neighbouring field and contacted us for assistance. Our political advice included a suggestion that Mr Jenkin ask his MP Dr Roz Savage (South Cotswolds, LD) to table a written parliamentary question to Defra to help uncover what it and Natural England were doing. The government’s response to Dr Savage’s question was not encouraging.

“Natural England (NE) is dealing with historic weeds complaints but is not currently taking new complaints. This is a temporary measure whilst NE reviews with Defra the approach to addressing injurious weeds, to improve access to appropriate advice and guidance and ensure enforcement resources are targeted most effectively.” 

As Mr Jenkin pointed out, Natural England already has an ‘off season’ for Weeds Act complaints that runs between October and March, and it seems difficult to explain why any review of its approach could not have been conducted in that period.

Since then, the Alliance has been pushing Defra and Natural England to commit to re-opening its complaints procedure and ceasing to abdicate its responsibilities in this area. While the “off season” remains, the government website has now been updated, and complaints will once again be accepted between the 1 April and 30 October 2026. Natural England will aim to respond to valid complaint forms within 10 working days. The Alliance will continue to monitor the situation.

The updated guidance can be found here and complaints form for use from 1 April here.