Guidance

Agreement holder's guide: Woodland Creation and Maintenance grants from 9 February 2021

Published 24 February 2021

Applies to England

6 Scheme requirements and procedures

You must read and meet the requirements detailed in this section as these are mandatory for all Woodland Creation and Maintenance grant agreement holders.

‘Agreement Holder’ means the person (whether an individual, a company or other entity) who has entered into the Countryside Stewardship Agreement as identified in the Agreement Document (in line with clause 1 of the Terms and Conditions – read Annex 1).

‘Agreement Land’ is defined in clause 1 of the Terms and Conditions.

If your application is successful we will send you an agreement offer letter.

6.1 Entering into an Agreement

There are two elements to the agreement for this grant.

1. The woodland creation element of the agreement
2. The woodland maintenance element of the agreement.

If you want to accept the Woodland Creation and Maintenance agreement, you must return the signed acceptance declaration to us within 20 working days of the date of the letter. If you do not accept your offer in time, we will withdraw it. You may also need to apply to Natural England for Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) consent, if applicable (read para. 4.5.1). Your agreement cannot start until that consent is granted by Natural England.

The agreement start date will be set out in the agreement document that comes with the agreement offer letter.

Once you have accepted the offer and entered into an agreement, you cannot modify, extend or amend the agreement without our written permission.

If you are eligible, we will send you the woodland maintenance element of the agreement after your payment for your final woodland creation claim.

6.2 Record keeping

You must keep all records relevant to the expenditure of the grant for at least 7 years from the end of the agreement. The 7 year period starts when each agreement has ended:

• If your agreement continues with the maintenance element of this grant, the 7 year period begins from the end of the 10 year maintenance period.
• If your agreement only covers the creation element of this grant, the 7 year period begins from the end of the 5 year durability period.

All records kept must be dated on or after the agreement start date. We will reject claims and will not pay them if, during an inspection, we find that you ordered or bought items before the start of the agreement or you carried out part or all of the work before, or after, the agreement period.

6.3 Evidence: Record keeping and environmental outcome site visit requirements

You must obtain and keep evidence to show that you have carried out all the requirements of your agreement to support your claim or to support an environmental outcome site visit. You must also keep evidence that you are eligible for the scheme.

Your evidence must show that:

• you are eligible for the scheme
• the activities funded under your agreement are appropriate
• the funded activity is taking or has taken place.

We need you to do this so that we can demonstrate that public money is being spent effectively and is delivering the intended results.

Record keeping is an important part of an effective farm, or woodland management system. You can use some existing farm records to meet scheme requirements, but you may also need to keep other records specifically about the management being funded.

The record keeping requirements for each capital item are published in the Countryside Stewardship online grants finder tool.

6.3.1 When is evidence required?

You must keep any required evidence and supporting documents and have them available on request.

a. Evidence to support your application

You must keep evidence to show that you, the business, your land and capital items are eligible as you may have to show this if you are chosen for an environmental outcome site visit.

b. During the agreement period

You may need to provide evidence to show that you have carried out the required actions. Evidence may be needed:

• to support a claim. More information is set out in the following sections, and where relevant further information will be sent with the claim form covering letter
• during or after an administrative check, an inspection, or other checks as described in section 7.

c. After the agreement period

The Terms and Conditions explain you must keep all invoices, receipts, accounts and any other relevant documentation relating to the expenditure of the grant for at least 7 years from the end of the agreement.

6.3.2 General evidence requirements for applicants and agreement holders

It is your responsibility to get all consents, approvals or permissions that you may need due to your specific circumstances and to carry out the particular capital item. These consents, approvals and permissions must remain effective for the duration of the agreement, and records kept for 7 years from the end of the agreement.

6.4 Photographic evidence

You need to keep dated photographic evidence for capital items to support an application and any claims. You must make this available when we ask for it, for example as part of administrative record checks or during an inspection.

6.4.1 Summary

You must follow the requirements below.

a. Application stage

You need to take and retain dated photographs showing where works will take place. Your photographs must meet the required standards, explained below.

b. Claim stage

For a partial or full claim, you must take a dated photograph after the works have been completed and send it with your payment claim. This must show the ‘works completed condition’. The ‘application’ and ‘works completed’ photographs must be taken from the same position.

6.4.2 Photographic evidence quality

All photographs must meet the following standards. Requirements apply equally to digital photographs or those supplied as paper photographs.

• Quality – photographs must be in focus and clearly show the relevant capital item or environmental feature. If you send your images by email, please send as JPEG files. Digital images should not be smaller than 600 x 400 pixels and ideally the image file size no larger than 400 KB. Printed photographs must be no smaller than 15 cm x 10 cm. Photographs can be in either portrait or landscape.
• Photograph to identify the environmental feature or capital item(s) concerned – it is your responsibility to have sufficient evidence that the investment or required management has taken place. For example, more than one photograph may be needed where the feature or capital item exceeds the frame or is not clearly evident from a single photograph.
• Where possible, include a significant feature to provide authenticity, for example, ditch, fence, farm building, road, telegraph poles.
• Where possible, mark the photographed feature location, and direction from which the photograph has been taken, with an ‘X’ and an arrow on a copy of a map (or map extract) of the agreement area.
• Where scale or continuity is important, include a feature, or introduce one, for example a quad bike, vehicle or use a sighting pole (2m high with 50cm intervals marked in red and white). Take pictures consistently from the same spot for before and after photographs of the capital item.

6.4.3 Clearly labelled photographs

Use the Ordnance Survey (OS) map sheet reference and National Grid reference for the field parcel where the works are taking place, the implemented capital item code, date, agreement holder name and SBI. If you are sending more than one image, also include the image number.

For example, if we ask you to send ‘before and after’ photographs to support capital item tree planting (TE4) the images should be labelled as OS Ref Capital item code_Date_Name_SBI_Image number.

Save digital images under the label outlined above.

6.5 Publicity requirements

The Terms and Conditions require you to comply with all instructions and guidance relating to acknowledging and publicising the support provided. This includes using any materials or templates which are provided for this purpose.

6.6 Force majeure

You may be unable to meet your requirements under the agreement because of force majeure or exceptional circumstances. If this happens, you must write to tell us within 8 weeks from the date on which you (or any person authorised to act for you) are able to do so. You will need to provide evidence in writing to show:

• what has happened
• how the event meant you were unable to meet the scheme rules.

Force majeure or exceptional circumstances may include, but are not limited to:

• the death or long-term professional incapacity of the Agreement Holder
• a severe natural disaster gravely affecting the holding
• the accidental destruction of livestock buildings on the holding
• an epizootic or a plant disease affecting part or all of the Agreement Holder’s crops, trees or livestock
• expropriation of all or a large part of the holding (provided that the expropriation could not have been anticipated at the time the application for funding was made).

We will consider the facts to decide whether or not the Agreement Holder is relieved of all or part of their obligations under the agreement, and whether all or part of the grant should be withheld or repaid.

If you are aware of the issue when entering into your agreement then it is unlikely to fall under force majeure or exceptional circumstances.

7 Agreement management

The terms and conditions cover Woodland Creation and Maintenance applications received from 9 February 2021.

You must read and meet the requirements detailed in this section as these are mandatory for all Woodland Creation and Maintenance grant agreement holders.

7.1 Amendments

Once we have offered you a grant, you cannot change or amend either part of your agreement without our written permission.

It’s important that there is consistent management during the period of your agreements to make sure that the environmental benefits are achieved. We will therefore only agree to changes that are necessary to achieve the objectives of the scheme.

You should contact us if you would like to discuss an amendment to your agreement. We must agree to the request before you make any changes and we will write to tell you if your request is successful. The amendment will not be valid until you have received a letter from us agreeing to the amendment and advising you of the date from which it will take effect. You must continue to manage your agreement under the existing prescriptions until the date the amendment takes effect.

Variation of agreements

Occasionally, we may need to vary the agreement in line with changes to law and in other exceptional circumstances. In applying for the scheme, you accept that such changes may be made at any time. We will tell you about these changes on our website in a ‘List of changes’ document. Where the changes will significantly affect the land management required, or financial aspects of the agreement, we will tell you.

If adjustments are needed to meet changes in regulations, relevant mandatory standards, requirements or obligations but you are not prepared to accept these changes, your agreement will end. You will not need to repay monies from the agreement.

Minor and temporary adjustments to agreement management

You may consider that, due to factors beyond your control in a particular year, you will be temporarily prevented from carrying out some of the management required under your agreement. If this is the case, you can apply to us for a minor and temporary adjustment to the management requirements that apply that year.

You must apply for permission to do this and we must grant permission before you stop any work, or you carry out any additional work. Failure to do so is a breach of the agreement and may be subject to recoveries.

You can request a minor and temporary adjustment to the management requirements set out in the agreement by filling in a Minor and Temporary Adjustment form on GOV.UK.

Once you have filled in the form, you need to return it to us by email to ruralpayments@defra.gov.uk. If you are unable to access the internet you can call us and request a paper form. We’ll send you a form to fill in and return to us by post (see below for our contact details).

Permission is not automatic and we require a reasonable time to consider any request.

In most cases we will deal with simple, straightforward cases within 20 working days of receiving your form. We will deal with more complicated cases as quickly as possible, although we may need to contact you to clarify details. If you act without written or conditional permission, recoveries and/or reductions for a breach of agreement may be applied.

When looking at your request, we will consider the following:

• alternative management

• the specifics of the minor and temporary adjustment: what adjustment is necessary, where and for what period of time it will apply

• the impact of the proposed activity on the payment

• the net environmental impact of the proposed activity

• evidence from third parties

• the administrative cost of making a reduction to the payment (if required).

You will not be reimbursed for any additional management costs that might arise from a minor and temporary adjustment.

We cannot approve a minor and temporary adjustment to an agreement if this is likely to, or will, lead to a breach of legislation, general scheme requirements, eligibility conditions, or the cross compliance rules.

If we agree to the suggested minor and temporary adjustment, we will write to or email you with permission. You should keep this approval with your Agreement Document.

7.2 Agreement Holders using own labour or contractors for capital works

7.2.1 Using own labour for multi year management options and capital works

You can use your own labour to carry out capital works. If you do so, you will need to prepare time sheets signed by the employee and employer showing all of the following:

• the hourly rate for your labour or a farm employee’s labour

• what work was carried out

• the date the work was carried out.

You must keep these records either on paper or electronically for the period of the agreement and for the 7 years following the end of the agreement. You must also produce them if we ask you to.

Please note that payment is reduced if you use your own labour for capital item FY2 (Woodland Infrastructure). Refer to the Capital Item FY2: Woodland Infrastructure (Further Information) section for further information.

7.2.2 Using contractors for multi year management options and capital works

You can employ contractors to carry out agricultural work on agreement land, or to carry out work needed under the Countryside Stewardship capital items.

You must tell the contractor about the agreement and its requirements. It is your responsibility to make sure that work carried out by contractors does not breach the terms of your agreement. If the contractor commits any breaches on the land, you will be responsible for any payment reductions.

You must keep records of the work carried out by contractors in either paper or electronic form, for the full period of the agreement and for at least 7 years after your agreement has ended. You must also produce these records if we ask you to.

7.3 Making a claim for payment

You should sign into the Rural Payments Service and submit a claim online.

You can find guidance on how to submit a claim online on GOV.UK.

If you cannot make a claim online, contact us to ask for a claim form.

7.3.1 Woodland Creation

You can submit a claim for reimbursement of capital items at any time of the year, but we must receive the final claim within 3 months of the end date of the Woodland Creation element of your agreement.

7.3.1.1 Summary

The work must have been completed as per the terms of your agreement and have been paid for in full before you can submit your claim. This means the payment must have left your bank account before you submit your claim. Please note:

• the minimum value of any payment claim is £500 (an exception may be made for the final payment)

• if you have used a contractor to deliver the works, you must have paid them (and the funds left your account) before you can claim from us

• we must receive your claim and supporting information (including photos) within 3 months of the agreement end date. Late claims will not be paid

• valid claims will be paid within 2 months of receipt.

7.3.1.2 Submitting claims for capital items

Once the capital works are finished and you have paid for them in full and the payment has left your bank account, sign into Rural Payments service to submit a payment claim online.

You can find guidance on how to submit a payment claim online at How to make a capital or revenue claim for Countryside Stewardship.

You must keep evidence that the work is finished. Section 6.4 explains the photographic evidence you need to keep and you can find details of the individual option requirements at Countryside Stewardship grants.

We will make payments directly into your bank account.

You must maintain any capital items funded through the scheme in the same condition and specification set out in your agreement for 5 years from the date of final payment (read section 2.2).

7.3.2 Woodland Maintenance

We must receive your payment claims for the woodland maintenance element of this grant by midnight on 15 May of the relevant claim year.

We must receive your first claim in the first year of your maintenance agreement, regardless of the agreement start date; for example, if the agreement’s start date is in April, the claim form must be received by 15 May in the following month, not in the following year.

If 15 May is on a Bank Holiday, other public holiday or weekend the deadline is the next working day.

If you miss the 15 May deadline, you can make a late payment claim until midnight on 9 June but we will apply a reduction. For each working day your payment claim is late, we will apply a 1% reduction to your payment.

If 9 June is on a Bank Holiday, other public holiday or weekend, you can make a late payment claim until midnight on the next working day.

You cannot make payment claims after midnight on 9 June (apart from in cases of force majeure). Your payment claim must include any paperwork needed to support your claim.

You can find more information at WD1: Woodland creation - maintenance payments.

7.3.3 Payment for multi-year management options

We check your claim to make sure that it is correct and may visit you to review how you are carrying out the option(s) in your agreement. If your claim is correct we will pay you. If we need to make reductions to your claim, we will apply these to your payment. In most cases we make annual payments for multi-year management options in one instalment.

We usually start making payments for multi-year management options in the December following the claim, up until June.

7.3.4 The impact of transfers on claims

If you are in the process of buying or selling land, you need to consider the rules on who should submit a claim. Read Section 6.8 of this manual if you are:

• an Agreement Holder in the process of selling all or part of the land under agreement and transferring the agreement management obligations for this land to the purchaser

• buying land from an Agreement Holder and taking on the agreement management obligations from the seller.

It will depend on whether the land transfer takes place before, on, or after 15 May, as to who should submit claims and who will receive payment.

For BPS, the payment is made to whoever submits the BPS application by 15 May.

For Countryside Stewardship any outstanding payments are made to the transferee (new owner/occupier) providing they take on the agreement and are eligible.

If you tell us about a transfer by 15 May, the transferee can claim BPS. However, if you tell us after 15 May, we make:

• the BPS payment to the transferor

• the Countryside Stewardship payment to the transferee.

7.3.5 Claims from land managers with multiple agreements

If your business covers a number of farms but is managed as a single unit, or uses one Single Business Identifier (SBI) number, you can have more than one agreement for that SBI. If you have multiple agreements in place, you must submit a separate multi-year CS payment claim in the usual way, but must also submit a separate over-arching declaration covering all of the agreements before we can pay any of the multi-year claims.

7.3.6 Changing a claim after it has been received

You can change an annual maintenance payment claim up to midnight on 31 May without us having to apply a reduction. If you make a change between 1 June and midnight 9 June, we will apply a 1% reduction to the land parcel and option which the change relates to.

You cannot change a claim after 9 June, apart from:

• cases of force majeure

• where you withdraw all or part of a claim, or

• obvious error

7.3.7 Payments for all agreements

We (RPA) will make all payments directly into the Agreement Holder’s nominated bank account.

7.4 Scheme checks and site visits

We are required to make sure that Countryside Stewardship is properly controlled, to protect public money. To support this we undertake administrative checks and site visits to monitor Agreement Holder compliance with the rules governing their agreements (and cross compliance on the whole holding) and the success of Countryside Stewardship overall.

We undertake three main checks:

• administrative record checks

• agreement monitoring visits

• environmental outcome site visits.

You must allow the RPA (or their authorised representatives or auditors) to access your land or premises to carry out Countryside Stewardship site visits. Other UK public authorities may also visit you to make sure you are meeting cross compliance requirements. Natural England, the Forestry Commission or Historic England may also visit your site to monitor environmental progress or check you are following specific management.

You must help and co-operate with any person carrying out a site visit. Any refusal to do so or obstruction will be treated as a breach of the Countryside Stewardship terms and conditions, and you may face recovery, suspension or termination of your agreement.

7.4.1 Administrative record checks

We will check all stages of the application and claim processes, including your application form, claim forms and, where appropriate, the nature and quality of any supporting evidence, such as receipts and farm records. This is to make sure that you meet eligibility requirements at the application stage, and that various forms and records match up during the whole agreement period.

If you do not provide records when asked, or there are discrepancies, we will treat this as a breach of your agreement. It is your responsibility to keep such records if you want to rely on this to support your claim.

As part of the administrative checks on annual claims, we select a percentage where we carry out follow-up checks of agreement holder records. Therefore, we may ask you to send us copies of your on-farm records for us to check. We may also ask you to send dated photographs for some land management options. We will give reasonable advance notice of when you should take the photographs and the final date for return of records.

7.4.2 Agreement monitoring visits

Advisers may visit sites to monitor environmental progress, discuss site reports, or if you ask us to visit.

Results from these visits will be discussed with us and appropriate action taken.

7.4.3 Environmental outcome site visits

Each year, we will carry out site visits on a sample of agreements, to make sure environmental aims are being delivered and scheme aims or requirements have been met.

You must follow the requirements for the specific item, including any specifications you need to adhere to and retain any records that are required to support your claim.

If at the visit we find a breach of the rules, we may apply reductions (read Section 7.5). You can find more information on visits at Agreement holders’ information on GOV.UK.

7.4.4 Refusal or withdrawal of support claimed

In certain cases we may refuse or withdrawn in full the support claimed. We will do this if we think that any of the following has happened:

• You have committed a serious non-compliance.

• You have provided false evidence

• You have negligently failed to provide the necessary information (for instance, where we have asked for it repeatedly and there is no reason why you have not provided it). If we have to withdraw support, it will be for the current calendar year and the following calendar year. We may also refuse support for other agri-environment or forestry schemes. If this is the case, we will tell you and you will have the right to appeal against this decision.

7.4.5 Cross compliance

If you receive Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) payments, you must follow the cross compliance rules.

If you do not receive BPS payments, and your only agri-environment or woodland agreement is the Woodland Creation and Maintenance agreement, you do not need to follow the cross compliance rules during the initial woodland creation stage of the agreement. However, you must follow cross compliance rules once the Maintenance element of your Woodland Creation agreement starts.

If you are required to follow cross compliance rules and we find a breach of these rules anywhere on your holding (including associated common land) by any of the following, we will inform the relevant body responsible:

• you

• others acting under your control

• anyone with access to the holding under the terms of an agreement including contractors, employees or family members.

The cross compliance guide changes annually, so you need to read the latest version of the Guide to Cross Compliance in England to find out about cross compliance rules.

7.5 Recoveries and reductions

7.5.1 Breaches of Agreement

If you breach the terms of your agreement or you do not meet the eligibility criteria on all or part of your agreement land, we may reduce or withhold future grant payments and may recover payments already made to you. We will write to you to explain why we are considering if there is a breach of agreement. We will give you an opportunity to make written representations before we make our final decision.

In cases of fraud or severe non-compliance we can withhold all support and stop a new Countryside Stewardship application being made, for up to 2 years.

If you are concerned that you may not be able to deliver all of the capital works in the agreement you should contact your local Forestry Commission Woodland Officer to discuss any implications on the agreement.

7.5.2 Over-declaration of expenditure

If we receive a claim for more than the value of the costs which are eligible to be claimed, we will reduce the payment to the correct amount.

7.6 Change of ownership

7.6.1 Woodland Creation

You cannot transfer your agreement.

If you sell or let, all or part of the land under your Woodland Creation agreement to another party, we will end the agreement on those parcels. You may need to repay all or part of the grant payments you have already received.

7.6.2 Woodland Maintenance

We will consider requests to transfer an agreement (in whole or part) to another party due to:

• a change in business structure

• death

• inheritance

• sale, lease or other similar transfer of land.

If we approve the transfer request, any options associated with the transferred land parcels will have a stand-alone Countryside Stewardship agreement on the same terms and conditions. You cannot re-negotiate the agreement at the point of transfer and cannot add the land under the agreement to another agri-environment agreement.

The agreement will expire at the end of the original agreement term.

You should tell the new owner/occupier about the agreement before transferring any Agreement Land.

The new owner/occupier (transferee) should contact us for a Transfer Request Form, to fill in and return to us, using our details below.

If the new owner or occupier is willing to continue with the agreement they must fill in and return the relevant part of the Transfer Request Form to confirm this as soon as possible and no later than 90 calendar days beginning with the first day after the date of the transfer.

If either of the following apply we will terminate the agreement for that land:

• the new owner or occupier chooses not to continue with the agreement on the transferred land

• we do not receive the new owner or occupier’s confirmation of their intention to continue with the agreement on the transferred land.

You will not need to repay any multi-year annual payments for the period when the Agreement Land was in your ownership or occupation because of the transfer. (However, if you have breached the agreement you may need to repay monies).

If there are capital items associated with the transferred land parcels, you must contact us. You may need to repay all or part of any grants received for capital items.

If you only transfer part of your Agreement Land, we expect you to continue with the existing options on the land you have kept in your agreement. The amended agreement will run for the remaining term of the original agreement.

7.7 Disputes, appeals and complaints

If you are unhappy with we have decision taken about your application or agreement, you can appeal.

7.7.1 Appeals process – disagreeing with a decision by RPA

If you’re unhappy with a decision or service you’ve had from the Rural Payments Agency (RPA), you can email, write or call us.

Full guidance about how to complain is available online at: Complaints procedure.