Biodiversity: Impact of Neonicotinoids

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Thursday 14th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

The ability to consider this emergency authorisation comes from EU legislation. It is not a case of reducing our standards after leaving the EU, since 10 EU countries including Belgium, Denmark and Spain granted emergency authorisations for neonicotinoid seed treatments used on sugar beet in 2020, just as we have done this year. Our position on these pesticides remains exactly the same; there is no divergence. We supported restrictions in 2018 and this is a narrow emergency authorisation, which has been made on the merits of the case.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a rather poor amateur beekeeper, for environmental reasons. Give that the evidence is that neonics are highly toxic to bees—5,000 to 10,000 times more than DDT—the importance of pollinators, and that we know that the residue which is lethal to bees will lie on leaves for several days, is it really sensible to even consider opening the door to the use of this lethal material? I appreciate that there is no evidence that the bee colony collapse is entirely related to this material but, given the pressures on bee populations, is it not rather irresponsible to consider making a derogation even as limited as this?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

Pollinators have an almost unimaginable and incalculable importance. They are an essential part of our environment; they play a crucial role in food production and have suffered huge decline. There have been some promising signs over the last two or three years. Nevertheless, the news for pollinators in this country is bad. We have a national pollinator strategy with a 10-year plan, which involves significant ramping up of our efforts to create habitat for pollinators, strengthening the monitoring and management of honey bee diseases and threats from invasive non-native species such as the Asian hornet. The decision we are discussing was assessed by the Health and Safety Executive, Defra scientists and the UK Expert Committee on Pesticides. They all considered that evidence, and the view was that the conditions placed were sufficient to remove the threat that noble Lords are concerned about.