Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to introduce more stringent biosecurity measures to reduce the risk of African Swine Fever entering the UK, building on the mitigation measures introduced in September.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Preventing an outbreak of African swine fever in the UK remains one of Defra’s key biosecurity priorities. UK safeguard measures are in place prohibiting live pigs, wild boar, or pork products from affected European Union (EU) areas from entering Great Britain. Enforcement is carried out by Border Force and Port Health Authority officers at seaports and airports.
Under the enhanced safeguard measures introduced in September, travellers are no longer allowed to bring pork products into Great Britain unless they are produced and packaged to the EU’s commercial standards and weigh no more than two kilograms.
Defra and its agencies continuously review the spread of African swine fever and are ready to introduce further biosecurity restrictions should these be deemed necessary in response to new scientific and risk data. Risk assessments can be found on GOV.UK: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/animal-diseases-international-monitoring.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what are the minimum and maximum kill targets for each area for the intensive badger cull that began around 1 September.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
On 30 August, the Government announced the start of work on a comprehensive new strategy for England, to drive down bovine tuberculosis (TB) rates to save cattle and farmers' livelihoods and end the badger cull by the end of this parliament. This will be under-taken in co-design with farmers, vets, scientists and conservationists, ensuring the new strategy marks a significant step-change in approach to tackling this devastating disease.
The published policy guidance as introduced by the previous Government requires Natural England to set a minimum and maximum number of badgers to be removed for bovine TB disease control purposes. These numbers are published annually on GOV.UK and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/bovine-tb-authorisation-for-badger-control-in-2024.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to revise the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023 or its associated regulations.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government does not have any plans to revise the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act, 2023. Currently, there are no associated implementing regulations, but my department will lay before parliament the secondary legislation required to unlock the benefits of the Precision Breeding Act as soon as parliamentary time allows.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what progress they have made in meeting the 1 October 2024 deadline to address the recommendations in Decision VII/8s, adopted by the Meeting of the Parties to the Aarhus Convention at their Seventh meeting in 2021, concerning compliance by the UK with its obligations under the Aarhus Convention.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK Government is committed to the effective implementation of its international obligations under the Aarhus Convention on access to information, public participation and access to justice in environmental matters.
The submission of the UK’s final Progress Report has been delayed to allow the new Government time to consider the recommendations in decision VII/8s, endorsed at the 2021 Meeting of the Parties.
We look forward to responding in due course.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether farmers in the vicinity of the recently announced open field trials of gene-edited crops on 25 commercial farms in England will be given notice of the trials and the opportunity to object.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
These plants only contain genetic sequence that could arise through traditional breeding. However, unlike equivalent trials for traditionally bred plants, Defra asks for confirmation that the person with overall responsibility for them will put in place appropriate measures, as necessary, to minimise the possibility of material from the plants entering the human food or animal feed systems.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to introduce biosecurity measures to ensure gene-edited crops do not enter the human food or animal feed systems, or the wider environment, in the light of the recent announcement of field trials of gene-edited crops on 25 commercial farms.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We have no plans to introduce biosecurity measures for all research trials involving gene-edited plants. These plants only contain genetic sequence that could arise through traditional breeding. However, unlike equivalent trials for traditionally bred plants, Defra asks for confirmation that the person with overall responsibility for them will put in place appropriate measures, as necessary, to minimise the possibility of material from the plants entering the human food or animal feed systems.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether the seed produced by the open field trials of gene-edited crops on 25 commercial farms in England will be tested in accordance with the regulations for the National Lists; and whether the seed will be identified and labelled as a genetically modified variety.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
All gene-edited seed must be authorised under GMO legislation before it can be marketed. We have not authorised these plants for marketing purposes and as such, the plant breeder cannot apply for National Listing.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they obtained a legal opinion on the status of crops grown under the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023 in relation to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety; whether the Cartagena Protocol requires these crops to be labelled as genetically modified organisms for the purpose of trade; and whether they will publish any legal opinion they have obtained.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Lawyers advised throughout the development of the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023. This included how the act related to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. As stated in the Legal background section of the explanatory notes to the Act, “The UK Government considers that the Cartagena Protocol does not apply to organisms produced using modern biotechnologies if those organisms could have occurred naturally or been produced by traditional methods.” If Precision Bred plants were traded, they would have to comply with the labelling requirements of the importing country.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to secure the recycling of medical blister packs, particularly to ensure that provision for collection is free, universal, and processing can be done in the UK.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Waste is a devolved policy, and the devolved administrations have their own arrangements for household and business recycling and waste collections. There are currently no plans for blister packs to be included in the list of materials to be collected at kerbside through Simpler Recycling reforms.
Modulation of pEPR fees, which will be introduced in from year 2 of the scheme, will be used to disincentivise packaging formats that are not readily recyclable.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of changes introduced by the Border Target Operating Model which came into force on 30 April, on the United Kingdom's environmental horticulture sector.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The impact of the Border Target Operating Model to cut flower trade is expected to be minimal.
A limited group of European Union (EU) cut flowers (such as chrysanthemum and carnations and orchids), are medium risk goods; all other EU cut flowers are low risk and will not be subject to border checks.
EU Medium risk cut flowers have been subject to prenotification since 1 January 2022 and EU Medium risk cut flowers have required a Phytosanitary Certificate (PC) since 31 January 2024, and inspections at the border since 30 April 2024.
EU Plants for planting are already classified as high-risk goods, and subject to inspection at place of destination. There is no change regarding the need for inspections, just a change of location of these inspections to Border Control Posts or Control Points.