Oral Answers to Questions

Christian Matheson Excerpts
Thursday 19th March 2020

(4 years, 1 month ago)

Commons Chamber
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Rebecca Pow Portrait The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Rebecca Pow)
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Such incidents are an issue for the Environment Agency, which is the first port of call in a pollution incident. Water companies have water management plans and, under the new Environment Bill, will have to have sewage management plans as well, which will help. Of course I will meet my hon. Friend to discuss the issue.

Christian Matheson Portrait Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
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I understand that in 2019, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and FareShare worked on a pilot scheme to make sure that surplus food was diverted to people who needed it. That is still being evaluated. When will Ministers come up with the evaluation? Is now not a good time to put the scheme into practice?

George Eustice Portrait George Eustice
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As I said, we are working with food banks and retailers to ensure that they have the supply of food they need through schemes such as FareShare.