Asked by: Baroness Thomas of Winchester (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will end emergency authorisations of neonicotinoids which are poisonous to bees.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This Government has been clear that we will change existing policies to ban the use of neonicotinoid pesticides that threaten bees and other vital pollinators by the next General Election.
Asked by: Baroness Thomas of Winchester (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to gather evidence on food insecurity in the UK.
Answered by Lord Gardiner of Kimble
There is no single definition of food insecurity. The factors that impact on household food security are complex. There are multiple indicators such as quality, variety and desirability of diet as well as total intake, not all of which are measured consistently. It is, therefore, very difficult and potentially misleading to attempt to develop a single classification of food insecurity.
Defra publishes annual statistics to show the proportion of household income spent on food by (a) all households and (b) the lowest income 20% of households. Lower income families spend a greater proportion of household income on food (15.7% compared to 11.4% for the average household). This has remained stable over recent years: 16.5% in 2013, 16.6% in 2012, 16.6% in 2011, 15.8% in 2010 and 16.1% in 2009. The most recent statistics are in the Food Statistics Pocketbook 2015 on the GOV.UK website.
Year on year food prices have continued to fall with an annual rate of inflation of -2.7 per cent in the year to March 2016. General inflation is 0.3 per cent, unchanged from January.