Limited sell-off of public forests to go ahead within four years, says Minister

The sales, expected to raise £100m for the Environment Department (Defra), were suspended amid a row over plans to dispose of the rest of the country’s forest estate.

Mrs Spelman said yesterday she was concerned the terms of selling the 15 per cent – the maximum allowed to be sold under current rules – did not provide adequate protection for access and other public benefits.

But she told MPs on the Environment Select Committee the sales would go ahead within the spending review, which runs to 2015, and the delay would not hit Defra’s budget.

And once protection for access and other benefits of woodland had been addressed, “the planned sales will be in a position to resume within the period of the spending review, and won’t have an impact on expenditure”.

The Environment Secretary also defended the consultation on plans to dispose of the remainder of the public forest estate to businesses, charities and communities which provoked widespread anger.

The plans would have led to the sale of the vast majority of 638,000 acres of woodland overseen by the Forestry Commission to raise up to £250m to counter the national deficit.

But during a House of Commons address when the consultation was dropped last month, Mrs Spelman said the Government had “got this one wrong”.

Yesterday, she insisted previous governments had already been selling off public forests and added: “I simply thought it was right to give the public the chance to be consulted about the future of the forest estate.”

The previously announced sale of the 15 per cent was suspended shortly before the consultation was dropped and an independent panel looking at the future of England’s forests is due to report back in the autumn.

Shadow Forestry Minister Gavin Shuker said: “The Tories need to come clean about their intentions for forests. This latest admission that ministers are still planning the biggest forest sale for a generation will be a bitter blow for everyone involved in the campaign to save our forests. This drives a coach and horses through Government claims that they will listen to what the independent panel has to say.”