Oral Answers to Questions

Lilian Greenwood Excerpts
Thursday 28th October 2021

(2 years, 5 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Victoria Prentis Portrait Victoria Prentis
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I visited the Kent agricultural showground last week for the very impressive national fruit show, and I was able to talk to many growers about the very tight labour market that we are suffering from at the moment. As my right hon. Friend knows, we have a seasonal workers pilot with 30,000 visas. Growers can also continue to recruit workers under the EU settlement scheme. For the longer term, we are working with the Department for Work and Pensions to encourage the recruitment of more UK workers and undertaking a review of how automation will help with this issue.

Lilian Greenwood Portrait Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)
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Every weekend, people are out fishing, rowing, kayaking and paddleboarding, enjoying the rivers and canals in Nottingham. They are horrified to learn that there have been hundreds of thousands of sewage discharges into England’s waterways and that, under this Government, the Environment Agency has suffered huge cuts to funding for monitoring water quality and prosecuting polluters. What resources will the Secretary of State’s Department commit to addressing the dirty water crisis?

George Eustice Portrait George Eustice
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We have doubled the size of the catchment sensitive farming scheme, which supports farmers to reduce pollution on their farms, and we have increased resources to the Environment Agency and put additional inspectors on this task.