Plant Protection Products (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2023

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend and thank him for presenting these very welcome measures. As I understand them, they are completing some unfinished business since the UK left the European Union. I have some brief questions for him—one of which I think he may not be able to reply to this evening, so I encourage him to write if possible. The first question relates to the time. I think my noble friend said that these measures would exist for three and a half years. He will be aware that the NFU had hoped that seed permits, in particular, could be reinstated for five years, or be valid for the duration of authorisation of the reference product. Just to help my greater understanding, can my noble friend explain why three and a half years was chosen, as opposed to five years, which would have given greater certainty to those who are using the products in question?

Also, the NFU has asked whether it is possible for Defra to put a commitment in place for longer-term measures. I wonder whether, particularly in relation to both seed treatment technology and a future GB parallel trade scheme, the Government might consider longer-term measures. I will revert to that in a moment.

My noble friend may be aware that FERA, the Food and Environment Research Agency, is based in Sand Hutton, in the constituency I had the honour to represent for five years, very close to York. I applaud the work that it does. It has asked to clarify this if possible. It appears that we are working off the old data requirements under previous regulations, specifically in looking at these products—data requirements for active substances under regulation EC 283/2013 and formulated products under a similar regulation, EC 284/2013. These have been updated, probably since we left the EU, for microbial biopesticides. Is it the case, in my noble friend’s experience, that we are working on out-of-date data? That could potentially be seen as an additional barrier to entry for companies seeking to use EU data. Is this something that the Government might keep under review?

Similarly, alarm bells were set ringing, certainly in the UK, when a decision was taken that I think potentially killed off a pesticide reduction regulation in the EU. The European Parliament was responsible for that on 21 or 22 November. This seems to give an advantage to countries such as Brazil, which is looking to produce some of these biopesticides, which would not normally have been something that the UK would look favourably on introducing into this country. Can my noble friend explain what the procedure is within Defra for the control of pesticides now?

I conclude by referring to the conclusion of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, in its first report of this Session in November this year. In paragraph 56, Defra is quoted in its reply as saying that

“the Government is committed to Integrated Pest Management … We expect to set out more detail on this in the National Action Plan on Pesticides, which will be published shortly”.

I know that that is always a very popular phrase in government and parliamentary circles. I just invite my noble friend, if it is at all possible this evening, to put a timeframe on “shortly”. Before Christmas? Before the end of January? Before the spring—which is another loose parliamentary term? That would go some way to reassuring those involved in seed management and pesticide control as to the Government’s thinking. With those few remarks, I welcome the regulations before us this evening.