Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he has had recent discussions with his counterpart in (a) the Ivory Coast, (b) Ghana, (c) Central African Republic, (d) Gabon, (e) Cameroon and (f) other countries in the region on taking further steps to help tackle the poaching of forest (i) elephants and (ii) elephant calves.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT). We are increasing our funding and will invest a further £30 million between 2022 and 2025.
Defra Ministers and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office officials at Posts regularly discuss important conservation matters including poaching of elephants. For example, the UK signed a letter of intent in December 2023 with Cameroon’s Minister of the Environment, Nature Protection, and Sustainable Development to deliver the Biodiverse Landscapes Fund.
Defra provides support for a variety of different projects that support rangers and protect elephants through the IWT Challenge Fund and direct programming, which are detailed below.
Information on total number of rangers is not available as we do not aggregate this data.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department is taking steps with (a) international counterparts, (b) charities and (c) rangers to help tackle the poaching of elephants.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT). We are increasing our funding and will invest a further £30 million between 2022 and 2025.
Defra Ministers and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office officials at Posts regularly discuss important conservation matters including poaching of elephants. For example, the UK signed a letter of intent in December 2023 with Cameroon’s Minister of the Environment, Nature Protection, and Sustainable Development to deliver the Biodiverse Landscapes Fund.
Defra provides support for a variety of different projects that support rangers and protect elephants through the IWT Challenge Fund and direct programming, which are detailed below.
Information on total number of rangers is not available as we do not aggregate this data.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many rangers received funding from his Department to help tackle the poaching of elephants in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT). We are increasing our funding and will invest a further £30 million between 2022 and 2025.
Defra Ministers and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office officials at Posts regularly discuss important conservation matters including poaching of elephants. For example, the UK signed a letter of intent in December 2023 with Cameroon’s Minister of the Environment, Nature Protection, and Sustainable Development to deliver the Biodiverse Landscapes Fund.
Defra provides support for a variety of different projects that support rangers and protect elephants through the IWT Challenge Fund and direct programming, which are detailed below.
Information on total number of rangers is not available as we do not aggregate this data.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to help tackle the illegal trade of ivory.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The UK Government is committed to protecting endangered animals and plants from poaching and illegal trade to benefit wildlife, local communities and the economy while protecting global security.
The UK Ivory Act 2018 came into force in June 2022, making it illegal to deal in items made of or containing elephant ivory, and in May this year we announced that the Act will be extended to other ivory bearing species. The Act contains offences for those who breach the ban, with a mix of civil and criminal sanctions, with a maximum fine of £250,000 or five years’ imprisonment.
The UK Government plays a leading role in tackling illegal wildlife trade and we are increasing funding by a further £30 million between 2022 and 2025. We have committed funding through the Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund on multiple projects to support protections for elephants, including £1 million to PAMS Foundation to strengthen law enforcement in Tanzania, Zimbabwe and Malawi to secure effective wildlife criminal prosecutions.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of increasing the ability of local authorities to design local waste disposal services.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Subject to compliance with regulations and having regard to any statutory guidance, local authorities currently have the ability to design their local waste disposal services.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of lead emissions from (a) petrol use, (b) tyre and break wear and (c) other types of use of road vehicles in the last 12 months.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Lead emissions are estimated in the National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory. The latest data available is for 2021. Data for 2023 will be published in February 2025.
Across the UK there were 34.5 tonnes of lead emissions from road transport in 2021, of which 34.1 tonnes were from tyre and brake wear, 0.36 tonnes were from petrol use, and 0.01 tonnes were from other sources in road transport (including diesel engines, lubricant use and natural gas).
Lead emissions from road transport have declined over the long term, largely due to a decline in emissions from the combustion of petrol (falling 99.9% since 1970).
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of his Department's waste policies for supporting (a) reuse, (b) prevention and c) recycling of waste materials.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Alongside our 2018 Resources and Waste Strategy, the Government’s ambitions to minimise waste were outlined earlier this year in Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste , our new Waste Prevention Programme for England. This sets out our priorities for action to manage resources and waste in accordance with the waste hierarchy across key sectors. It also embeds our circular economy approach by retaining materials and goods in circulation for as long as possible and at their highest value, including through increasing reuse, repair and remanufacture. The final chapter of the Programme sets out our plans to monitor and evaluate progress. We have indicators in place to capture changes and we will monitor trends over an extended period of time. In addition, through the National Interdisciplinary Circular Economy Research programme, experts will support Defra in exploring the metrics and data requirements needed to support a circular economy.
We are also introducing our Simpler Recycling reforms which will ensure that across England, people will be able to recycle the same materials, no longer needing to check what their council will accept for recycling. This policy will make recycling easier and ensure there is a comprehensive, consistent service across England. This will reduce confusion with recycling to improve recycling rates, ensuring there is more recycled material in the products we buy, and the UK recycling industry grows.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of the level of lead emissions from iron and steel production in the last 12 months.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Iron and steel installations in England are regulated under the Environmental Permitting Regulations 2016. All large industrial facilities must comply with environmental permits, use best available techniques (BAT) to reduce emissions to air, water and land, and monitor and report their emissions. The data submitted by operators is published on the UK Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (PRTR). Data from 2022, including lead emissions from iron and steel sites, will be published in December 2023.
The National Atmospheric Emission Inventory estimates total lead emissions from these industries. Data for 2023 will be published in February 2025.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the impact of waste disposal charges on fly-tipping.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
In 2021, we commissioned research into the drivers, deterrents and impacts of fly-tipping. It suggested that any friction in the services provided by local authorities, such as charges for waste disposal services, may impact on levels of fly-tipping. The report is available at Science Search (defra.gov.uk).
We believe it is important that local residents are able to dispose of their rubbish in a responsible and convenient manner. That is why last year we consulted on preventing charges for householders to dispose of DIY waste at household waste recycling centres. The government response was published on 18 June and we will be introducing legislation at the end of the year.
In our Waste Prevention Programme: Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste, we have committed to consult by 2025 on removing the fee for consumers to have bulky domestic furniture collected from their homes. This will make it easier for them to do the right thing with their items when they are no longer required.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of (a) developing and (b) using regenerable per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances as absorbing materials to help reduce the levels of carcinogenic and other toxic substances in drinking water.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The drinking water supply in England is of exceptionally high quality. Nevertheless, the Drinking Water Inspectorate has led the way through water safety planning to drive risk based research should there be the potential to change our world leading position. The removal of PFAS by barrier and adsorption methodologies is an ongoing DWI funded project due to report in the summer of 2024.