Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to support the restoration of footpaths in rural areas of England.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government recognises the importance of providing access to the outdoors for people’s health and wellbeing and are working to ensure this is safe and appropriate. We committed in our Environmental Improvement Plan to work across government to help ensure that everyone lives within 15 minutes’ walk of a green or blue space.
The Government is delivering a number of policies to increase access to nature including implementing a number of rights of way reforms which will streamline the process for adding new or lost footpaths to the rights of way network. Work is progressing on the England Coast Path, with nearly 800 miles now open to the public, and the designation of Wainwright’s coast to coast route across the north of England as a National Trail.
We are delivering the £14.5m ‘Access for All’ programme, which consists of a package of targeted measures in our protected landscapes, national trails, forests and the wider countryside to make access to green and blue spaces more inclusive. The Farming in Protected Landscape (FiPL) programme includes the provision for permissive access and capital items to support access to the countryside or improvements to access such as gates, stiles and interpretation.
Local highway authorities are responsible for the management and maintenance of existing public rights of way and are required to keep a Rights of Way Improvement Plan (ROWIP) to plan improvements to the rights of way network in their area. This must include an assessment of the local rights of way including the condition of the network.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what recent estimate they have made of the number of miles of footpaths that have been lost in rural areas in England in the past 10 years.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
No estimate has been made however the Government is committed to implementing the rights of way reform programme including extending the cut-off off date to 2031 for the recording of unregistered historic rights ways, the completion of the England Coast Path and designating Wainwright’s coast to coast route across the north of England as a National Trail.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to support the (1) planting, and (2) restoration, of hedgerows in England.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Hedgerows make a valuable contribution to climate change, our countryside and nature and we are already investing heavily in this crucial habitat. There are currently 79,741km of hedgerows with one, or both sides managed under Countryside or Environmental Stewardship options and we’ve supported 11,800km of hedgerow creation or restoration through Countryside Stewardship capital grants. Defra will continue to encourage and support hedgerows through our environmental land management schemes, including providing funding through the addition of a new Hedgerow standard as part of the Sustainable Farming Incentive in 2023.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of problems caused by hare coursing.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government has considered evidence from a wide range of stakeholders and the police on the problems cause by hare coursing. As a result, we strengthened the law last year to bring in tougher measures to help the police stamp out illegal hare coursing.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) turnip production in England, and (2) its value to the economy.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Whilst no assessment has been made of English turnip production and its value to the economy, provisional production data suggests that in 2021 the UK produced 92,000 tonnes of turnips and swedes, with a value of around £32 million.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the value to the UK economy of potato production.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Whilst no assessment has been made of the value to the UK economy of potato production, provisional data suggests that UK produced potatoes had a farmgate value of around £703 million in 2021.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to improve access to the countryside for people who use wheelchairs in England.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government has taken steps to improve access to the countryside for people who use wheelchairs in England such as committing to make the England Coast Path as easy to use as possible for those with disabilities. Our Access for All programme has committed £14.5m to make targeted access improvements in our protected landscapes, national trails, forests and the wider countryside to help bring the benefits of spending time in nature to everyone. For example, supporting Miles without Stiles programme to improve accessibility in the Peak District National Park.
Additionally, the Government has extended its Farming in Protected Landscapes programme to improve accessibility in our National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, including installing interpretation panels, replacing gates and stiles to improve access for people who use wheelchairs, and creating new permissive paths on farms and estates.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - 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 rights of walkers in England in accessing the countryside.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government recognises the importance of ensuring that walkers have the right to access the countryside, and there is legislation and mapping tools in place to support this. The Highways Act 1980 and The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 provide for the creation of new public rights of way, recording of existing rights of way and changes to the network. Similarly, the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 created open access land where walkers can roam freely.
The Government has developed Open Access maps, which allow walkers to identify areas of open access land, as well as Rights of Way Improvement Plans (ROWIPs) which require local authorities to assess and improve the condition of existing rights of way. The government has also provided funding through the Revenue Support Grant (RSG) to support local authorities in delivering their ROWIPs.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to prevent fly tipping in the countryside in England.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Local authorities are best placed to understand how to tackle fly-tipping in their local areas. We are supporting local action by providing funding of over £450,000 to help a number of councils purchase equipment, such as CCTV, that will help them tackle fly-tipping at known hot-spots, including in rural areas. A second round of grants will see a further £800,000 awarded later this year. In recent years we have also bolstered their enforcement powers, such as by giving them powers to issue fixed penalty notices and strengthening their ability to seize vehicles used for fly-tipping.
We are also working with a wide range of interested parties through the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group (NFTPG), including local authorities and the National Farmers Union to promote and disseminate good practice, including how to prevent fly-tipping on private land.
Asked by: Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what is their latest assessment of the steps being taken to ensure there are no shortages of UK-produced food on supermarket shelves.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Defra is closely monitoring markets and supply chains to explore the factors that have contributed to ongoing supply chain pressures and is considering how government and industry can work together to mitigate them, in the short and longer term
Defra has requested weekly data from supermarkets on supplies of the foods affected to ensure we have the latest available data. Supermarkets are confident that supply will be back to normal by the end of this month.
On March 3rd, Minister Spencer visited Thanet Earth to discuss the opportunities and challenges for growers within the sector. Defra has been engaging with primary producers and trade associations such as the British Growers Association, to assess potential risks to the supply of fruit and vegetables.
The UK has a highly resilient food supply chain, as demonstrated throughout the Covid-19 response. It is well equipped to deal with situations with the potential to cause disruption.
The Government Food Strategy sets out a plan to transform our food system to ensure it is fit for the future.
It aims to broadly maintain the current level of food that we produce domestically and boost production in sectors where there are the biggest opportunities – such as horticulture and seafood.
We want people, at home and abroad, to be lining up to buy British.
This strategy will support that commitment; to see more locally sourced food, food producers to be able to take advantage of trade deals, consumers to be confident in the British food that they are buying in their local supermarket.