Official Controls (Animals, Feed and Food, Plant Health etc.) (Amendment) (EU Exit) (No. 2) Regulations 2020

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Tuesday 19th January 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his introduction. I will begin with the official controls regulations on animals, feed and food, and plant health. As has been said, we debated regulations with the same title on 2 December, and here we are again going over the same ground. The first SI had to be passed by December to comply with our third-country status. The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, referred to safety in our sanitary and phytosanitary systems—SPS—and possible costs to businesses. I know that everyone was working flat out before Christmas and that some legislation had to be left until after 1 January, but I hope we will not come back yet again to debate the same issues but with minor amendments throughout 2021.

On this occasion, we are concerned with border control posts. As we have seen on regular news reports, the number of forms required to be completed to comply with EU official controls is very burdensome. SPS checks will, apparently, vary proportionately, depending on risk factors. This includes the import of live animals, products of animal origin or plant materials, depending on whether they are exported from a country with any current known incidence of relevant animal or plant diseases. If animal and plant products are imported from a country that has a known disease, this is a considerable risk to our farming and horticulture sectors. Can the Minister reassure us that he is confident that such imports will be disease free? The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, also referred to this.

I am pleased that the devolved Administrations have been consulted, with the Scottish and Welsh DAs having given consent. I understand that the SI does not apply to Northern Ireland. Like many others, I am extremely concerned about what I am seeing happening in Northern Ireland, with food shortages and some empty supermarket shelves. I am being somewhat opportunistic in mentioning the crisis in Northern Ireland; although it is not part of this SI, a situation has developed that needs urgent attention. Public confidence in the Government’s legislation post Brexit will be severely dented by what people see happening in Northern Ireland due to border controls.

Annexe 2 lists 30 operable amendments made by this instrument to EU exit legislation. I can see many old friends in that list. Many relate to products for human consumption. In the past, lax regulation of animal feedstuffs has led to some catastrophic disease outbreaks—I refer, of course, to BSE. We have learned many lessons along the way, but it is easy to relax rules, thinking we are safe, only to find that some unknown variant has crept back in through the back door. I ask the Minister: are there similar restrictions on the import of foodstuffs destined for animal consumption to those that there are for food destined for human consumption?

I turn to the plant health amendment regulations, which also deal with import controls from third countries. New plant health passports needed for qualifying Northern Ireland goods sent to the UK will apply only one way. Can the Minister say why plant passports are not needed for goods going in the opposite direction? The noble Baronesses, Lady Fookes and Lady McIntosh, touched on this.

Now that we are in a different regulatory and legislative regime, there is much that concerns us about how rules we have been used to relying on are being somewhat arbitrarily changed. The lifting of the ban on neonicotinoids to assist the sugar beet growers is one such example.

I know the Minister has long been an advocate of bees, and he will have his own personal views. It must therefore be difficult for him to feel any great enthusiasm for the change that the Secretary of State has made, and I would be interested to hear how he has managed to reconcile this dichotomy.

Friends of the Earth, which was referred to earlier in the debate, is concerned about the lack of transparency and access to information. The UK Plant Health Information Portal does not offer transparent or up-to-date information on the activities of the UK plant health risk group, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. This is a serious issue for those who wish to have access to this information. Can the Minister say why this is and whether the Government have any plans to rectify this omission?

I look forward to the Minister’s response to all the queries raised this afternoon. These SIs, although apparently minor, are important. On that basis, I am happy to see them approved.