Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 3 September 2014 to Question 193828, what steps she has taken to ensure the accuracy of data collected by the Food Standards Agency on mis-stunning of animals for slaughter.
Answered by George Eustice
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is due to complete a review into its monitoring and reporting of breaches of welfare legislation by the end of October.
Previously, only major and critical breaches were recorded, along with the actions taken to correct these. The FSA review is now also looking to strengthen recording of minor breaches. These minor breaches include where back-up stunning equipment is used or a second stun is carried out without the intervention of the Official Veterinarian and where there has been no injury, avoidable pain, distress or suffering to an animal. As with major and critical breaches, information on minor breaches would be collated centrally and reported to Defra, Welsh and Scottish Government on a monthly basis.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 1 September 2014 to Question 206013, what the reasons are for the delay in publication of the study commissioned by her Department.
Answered by George Eustice
The study to determine whether cage-based breeding can meet the needs of game birds (AW1303) has not been published because it is still being peer reviewed.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many staff were dedicated to food authenticity in (a) the Food Standards Agency and (b) her Department in each year from 2008 to date; and how much those bodies spent on food authenticity in those years.
Answered by George Eustice
In 2010, the Food Standards Agency (FSA) had 12 full time staff working in its Food Standards and Authenticity branch, which included food composition and standards as well as authenticity.
In the years 2008-2010, the FSA had between 3.5 and 4 staff members working solely on its Food Authenticity Research Programme, although other areas of authenticity-related policy work were carried out across the Standards branch.
The FSA has estimated that authenticity work associated with the food authenticity research programme had an annual research budget of around:
2008/09 | 2009/10 | 2010/11 |
£800,000 | £700,000 | £600,000 |
In 2010 22.6 full time equivalents (FTEs) were transferred to Defra under the Machinery of Government Changes.
Thirteen of these officials work wholly or partly on aspects of food authenticity. This includes work on food composition and standards, food labelling and related science, including developing methodologies for detecting food authenticity.
Three members of staff are dedicated to the Food Authenticity Research Programme in Defra, with additional support from an experienced external programme advisor.
The budget allocation for the Food Authenticity Research Programme transferred to Defra for 2011/12 onwards was £500,000 per year. This budget has been protected through re-prioritisation within Defra’s overall food science programme and actual spend on food authenticity in each of the last two years has been above this level, rising to £660,000 in 2013/14.
Defra works closely with the FSA which has responsibility for surveillance and enforcement. The FSA also makes available funds to Local Authorities as part of the National Co-ordinated Sampling Plan. These funds are not exclusively used for authenticity work, but a significant proportion funds authenticity testing. The funds allocated to the National Co-ordinated Sampling Plan were as follows:
2008/09 | 2009/10 | 2010/11 | 2011/12 | 2012/13 | 2013/14 |
£900,000 | £900,000 | £900,000 | £1.6 Million | £1.6 Million | £2.2 Million |
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether (a) she and (b) her predecessor had discussions with representatives of the agricultural and horticultural sectors on the potential effect on skills and recruitment into those sectors of the proposals to remove OCR environmental and land-based science from the curriculum; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Dan Rogerson
The Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual), the independent regulator of qualifications in England, consulted recently on proposals for completing the reforms of GCSEs and A levels (http://comment.ofqual.gov.uk/completing-gcse-as-and-a-level-reform/), including principles to guide the subjects that may be offered in the future. The consultation closed on 30 July 2014 and Ofqual have not yet announced the outcome. These proposals do not remove specific subjects from the curriculum; however, they may have implications for the range of subjects available as GCSE or A level qualifications provided by awarding organisations. The removal of some qualifications may be as a result of low take up of specific qualifications or significant overlap of content. As Ofqual is independent of Ministers, and is accountable directly to Parliament, neither the Secretary of State nor her predecessor have therefore discussed the proposals with agriculture and horticulture representatives, although they were able to respond to the consultation directly. I have asked Ofqual’s Chief Regulator, Glenys Stacey, to write to the Hon. Member. A copy of her letter will be placed in the House of Commons Library.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what estimate he has made of the number of homes reliant on off-grid energy in each (a) constituency and (b) local authority area.
Answered by Matt Hancock
DECC publish estimates of the number of households without a gas connection by local authority. These are available on the Government website at:
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what recent assessment he has made of the effect of changes in energy bills on households and businesses in rural areas.
Answered by Amber Rudd
The Government is concerned about the effect of changes in energy bills on all households and businesses, including those in rural areas and considers the needs of all types of households and businesses when developing policies.
We publish regular information on industrial energy prices and on domestic energy bills in DECC’s Quarterly Energy Prices. Industrial prices are only available at the UK level. Average domestic energy bills are produced for each of the 15 Public Electricity Supply (PES) regions in the UK:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/quarterly-energy-prices
We also publish regular information on the impact of policies on prices and bills.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what system his Department has put in place to carry out sample checks on imported fat; and what assessment he has made of the risks of imported fat being passed off as a meat product.
Answered by Jane Ellison
We have been advised by the Food Standards Agency that in accordance with European Union legislation, all consignments of meat, imported into the United Kingdom (UK) must be presented for official controls at designated Border Inspection Posts (BIPs) in the UK. All consignments must undergo documentary and identity checks to ensure they are the products attested in the required animal and public health certificate accompanying each consignment. In addition, 20% of all meat, including offal, and products of the bovine, ovine, caprine, porcine and equine species, passing through the BIP, must undergo a physical check, which may include a laboratory test. This rate is increased to 50% for poultry, rabbit and game meat. We have no reports of imported fat being presented as meat products from these controls.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will commission a study to assess the extent of mis-stunning at the point of animal slaughter in the UK.
Answered by George Eustice
I refer the Right Hon. Member to the answer I gave to the Hon. Member, the Member for Finchley and Golders Green, on 1 April 2014, Official Report, column 600W.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress her Department's study to determine whether cage-based breeding can meet the needs of game birds, reference AW1303 has made; what the cost of that study was; and for what reason the findings of that study have not been published.
Answered by George Eustice
The study commissioned by Defra to provide scientific evidence on whether cage-based breeding for pheasants and partridges can fully meet birds’ needs has been completed and is now being peer-reviewed. The study was commissioned in 2009 and was due to cost approximately £800,000. In 2010 Ministers reduced the cost to £426,000. The study will be published once the peer review is complete, later this year.
Asked by: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many meetings (a) Chris Elliot and (b) members of his team have had with representatives from the meat importation sector during the investigation into criminality in the food chain.
Answered by George Eustice
The City of London Police, working with their counterparts across Europe, are taking forward complicated and far-reaching criminal investigations into the Europe-wide horsemeat fraud.
During the course of his Review into the Integrity and Assurance of Food Supply Networks, Professor Elliott and his team carried out site visits, and met many industry stakeholders, regulators and consumers, including representatives from the meat importation sector.