Bat mitigation class licence: who can use it and when

The bat mitigation class licence is a standing licence held by Natural England under which registered consultants can authorise low impact works affecting a limited set of common bat species, without each project needing its own individual mitigation licence. It removes an application step, not a competence requirement. Only an ecologist Natural England has registered under the licence may use it, and the eligibility criteria are narrow enough that a meaningful proportion of development sites fall outside them.

All bat species in the United Kingdom are European protected species under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017, so damaging or destroying a roost is an offence unless it is licensed.

Class licence and individual licence compared

An individual licence under regulation 55 of the 2017 Regulations is granted for one project. The applicant sets out the works, the survey results, the mitigation and compensation, and Natural England tests the application against the three derogation tests: that the works serve a licensable purpose, that there is no satisfactory alternative, and that the favourable conservation status of the species will be maintained.

A class licence works differently. Natural England has already decided that works meeting defined criteria satisfy those tests, and it authorises a named pool of consultants to act under the licence. The consultant registers a site rather than applying for permission to carry out the works.

The practical gain is time. An individual application goes into a queue and is determined against a published service standard, which you should check on gov.uk before programming it. Registration under the class licence is a notification process and is considerably quicker. On a small conversion, that difference is often the whole of the ecology programme.

The practical cost is scope. The class licence carries fixed conditions that cannot be varied for the site, so where the mitigation design needs something the licence does not cover, the individual route is the only route.

Eligibility by species, roost type and impact

Eligibility turns on three filters applied together. Fail any one and the site is out.

Species is the first. The licence covers the more common species, and the rarer Annex II species, including the horseshoe bats, barbastelle and Bechstein's, are excluded entirely. A single record of an excluded species in the roost takes the site to an individual licence even if everything else qualifies.

Roost type is the second. Day roosts, night roosts, feeding perches and transitional or occasional roosts sit within the scope. Maternity roosts of conservation significance and hibernation sites generally do not. Where survey work shows a roost changes function across the season, classify it on its highest value use rather than on the visit that found the fewest bats.

Scale of impact is the third. The licence is built for small numbers of bats and for works where the roost can be retained, reinstated or replaced on site to a standard the licence specifies. Demolition of a building holding a substantial roost is outside it.

The honest summary for a reviewer: if the Bat Survey results describe anything other than a small, low value roost of common species, assume the individual route until the ecologist demonstrates otherwise.

Who may register as a consultant

Registration is personal to the ecologist, not to the consultancy. Natural England assesses the applicant's survey experience, the number and type of roosts they have worked on, their mitigation record and their existing survey licence, and adds successful applicants to the licence as registered consultants.

Two consequences matter when you are checking a submitted document. The name on the method statement must be the registered consultant, not a colleague. And the registration can be suspended or withdrawn, so a consultant registered when the survey was done may not be registered when the works happen.

Ask for the registration number and the expiry position at the point you review the report. A Protected Species Survey that does not name the person who will hold the licence is incomplete.

Site registration and notification

The sequence on a qualifying site runs as follows.

1. Preliminary roost assessment and, where triggered, emergence and re-entry surveys in the appropriate season.
2. Confirmation that the species, roost types and impacts all fall within the class licence criteria.
3. Planning permission and any other consents in place, because the licence cannot authorise works that are not otherwise lawful.
4. Registration of the site with Natural England by the registered consultant, with the method statement and the mitigation design.
5. Acknowledgement from Natural England, after which the works may proceed under the licence conditions.
6. Supervision of the works by or under the direction of the registered consultant, to the level the licence requires.

Step three catches developers who assume the ecology can run ahead of the planning application. It cannot, and a site registered before permission exists is not covered.

Record keeping and reporting

The licence imposes obligations that continue after the works. The registered consultant keeps records of every site registered, the survey evidence relied on, the works carried out, the mitigation installed and the bats encountered, and submits returns to Natural England on the cycle the licence sets.

For a reviewer, the checkable items are whether the mitigation shown on the drawings matches the method statement, whether the bat boxes or access features are specified by type and position rather than described generically, and whether anyone has been given responsibility for the monitoring the licence requires. Access features drawn as a note on a roof plan with no detail are the most common weakness.

Where a planning condition also requires mitigation, make sure the condition wording and the licence method statement say the same thing. Discharging a condition against a different scheme from the one the licence covers creates a problem for both.

Where an individual licence is still needed

The individual route remains necessary for excluded species, for maternity roosts and hibernacula of conservation value, for large roost losses, for works where no on-site replacement is possible, and for schemes where the mitigation involves off-site compensation or a phased programme the class licence does not contemplate.

It is also the right route where the ecology is uncertain. An individual application allows the derogation tests to be argued on the evidence, including the no satisfactory alternative test, which is where the planning and ecology cases meet. A local planning authority determining the application has its own duty to consider whether a licence is likely to be granted before it resolves to approve, so the licensing analysis belongs in the ecology chapter rather than being left to a later stage.

Sites also change. A Preliminary Ecological Appraisal carried out two seasons before construction may no longer describe the building, and an updated assessment is often the condition of using either route.

Effect on the construction programme

Survey seasons bind whichever licence you use. Preliminary roost assessments can be done at any time of year. Emergence and re-entry surveys run through the summer months, with the optimal window in the middle of that period, and a site that misses the season waits a year.

The class licence saves determination time at the back end, not survey time at the front. Where a scheme is programmed tightly, the sensible order is to commission the assessment early, establish whether the class route is available before the design is fixed, and design the mitigation into the drawings rather than adding it at discharge of conditions. Biodiversity obligations run alongside this: the Biodiversity Net Gain Assessment uses a different metric and a different timetable, and neither substitutes for the other.

Licensing decisions and survey work must be carried out by a suitably licensed ecologist. A licensed or competent professional is legally required here, and an AI-assisted draft is a starting point for that professional rather than a substitute for them.

This is general guidance rather than legal advice. Check the current licence terms and criteria on gov.uk, because Natural England revises them. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval. For specialist technical reports, qualified professional input may be required.