The Government is dropping controversial plans to sell off England’s publicly owned forests.
Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman is expected to announce the U-turn. Instead, the Government is to launch a new panel of experts to look at public access to forests and biodiversity issues.
The screaming headlines of recent days unleashed a storm of protest - and many thousands of complaining letters and e-mails. We all love forests. We all want to protect them. Unfortunately an idea to improve the way in which England's forests are managed has been over-simplified into a money-grabbing privatisation scheme. I do not think this is what should be done. I am also pretty sure that the policy was rolled out without proper thought - let alone consultation. Public pressure has now forced a rethink.The Government has already put on hold plans for an immediate sell-off of fifteen per cent of Foresty Commission land. A complete policy freeze is just a short matter of time.
The consultation process is still, technically, open. (Or it was when I updated this page at 10.05 17/02/2011)
The Woodland Trust still has its petition - hundreds of thousands have signed up.
But the National Trust think its game over - and so do I.

You can still print off the consultation document to send in your views to the Forestry Commission by clicking the link above, but frankly I would save some trees.