ENVIRONMENTAL campaigners have criticised a failure to to bring in new environmental protection laws in Scotland which would safeguard vital conservation work after the UK leaves the EU.

They say ministers have refused repeated requests to table new legislation to guarantee citizens and campaigners in Scotland the same rights they now had under European law.

WWF Scotland said it will make it much harder post-Brexit for campaigners to legally challenge the Scottish government for failing to uphold air quality standards.

It comes as a coalition of more than 30 leading Scottish environment charities made a new call for action seven months after warning that Scotland's rarest species face being obliterated in the fall-out from Brexit unless action is taken to ensure vital environmental protections are provided in Scotland.

READ MORE: Brexit threatens to wipe out Scotland's rarest animals and put at risk iconic landscapes

LINK wanted legally binding measures to ensure that the nation’s natural environment, wildlife and air and water quality are safeguarded through an Environment Act.  It says the UK’s planned departure from the EU “threatens to unravel critical environmental protections”.

Among immediate concerns was that there is no mechanism to replace the European Commission's LIFE-Nature Fund which has given £25 million over 25 years to Scotland to help with more than 25 vital conservation projects protecting the country's at-risk wildlife and landscape. Losers would include a bid to stop Scotland's red squirrels from becoming extinct.

The Herald:

The new call for action said the climate emergency added to the need for legislation.

The letter from LINK, whose members include the National Trust for Scotland and RSPB Scotland  says: “Nicola Sturgeon has acknowledged that our planet faces a climate emergency. Inextricably linked to this is growing ecological crisis.

“We must not let Brexit derail us from tackling these huge global challenges head on. Whatever the outcome of the current political uncertainties we need robust, binding, targets for the recovery of Scotland’s natural environment, to safeguard both nature and people.”

READ MORE: Scots charities warn new post-Brexit measures needed to stop overfishing and protect marine life

WWF Scotland, one of the LINK members, said that without legislation it would also make it more difficult to stop wildlife being "inhumanely" culled by Scottish Natural Heritage, a government agency.

Lang Banks, the director of WWF Scotland, said: “Citizens have a right to raise concerns but we now risk losing the ability to freely access environmental justice. We are in a climate emergency, we’re in the midst of a biodiversity crisis, and this is the point where we need to be ramping up our environmental protections. Brexit means we risk losing the protections we currently have, when we need them most.”

The Court of Justice of the EU ruled in October, last year that Britain is failing to protect numbers with environmentalists citing scientific evidence showing that more protection areas are needed, particularly in Scotland.

READ MORE: Charities want new legislation to protect environment after Brexit

Roseanna Cunningham, the Scottish environment secretary, responded to the letter by insisting her government was committed to matching or exceeding the EU’s environment laws, but she refused to confirm it would introduce a new environment act or oversight agency.

She said: “While our choice would be to remain fully within EU governance systems our approach will ensure we remain true to the EU environmental principles and ensure governance that fit Scottish needs, circumstances and ambitions. I welcome the continuing involvement of environmental NGOs and civil society in Scotland in this work.”