AN Oxfordshire conservation group has become one of the few to issue a positive response to the government's 25-year environment plan.

Wild Oxfordshire said the goals of the controversial plan, which was slammed by the Green Party, were 'synergistic' with many small environmental groups.

The headline ambition from the plan, published in January, was to 'eliminate avoidable plastics by the end of 2042', but the Greens called it a 'fluffy communications strategy'.

Wild Oxfordshire's community ecologist Roselle Chapman said: "From a community ecologist's point of view, this plan is more relevant to Oxfordshire’s local environment groups than might be expected. It acknowledges that there are more sections of society influencing land management than farmers and suggests less of a top down approach and therefore has much more relevance to local environment groups, parish councils and neighbourhood plans than one might initially expect."