Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
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 impact of Canine Fertility Clinics on the number of dogs from the brachycephalic breeds.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra does not hold the requested information. However, to understand the impact of dog breeding activities, including canine fertility businesses, on individual and overall breed health and welfare, Defra has commissioned an opinion from the Animal Welfare Committee. The opinion will be published in due course.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to help ensure that proposed increases to consumer water bills are used for infrastructure investment.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
I refer the hon. Member to the reply given to the hon. Member for Chippenham, Sarah Gibson, on 12 September 2024, PQ 3559.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what discussions he had with food import businesses before implementation of physical checks on (a) animal and (b) plant products entering from the EU.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Since the publication of the draft Border Target Operating Model (BTOM) on 5 April 2023, Defra and the UK Government have engaged with stakeholders from across industry, including many in the food supply chain, to inform design and promote readiness.
From publication of the draft, the Government undertook a six-week feedback period to capture input into the design of the BTOM. Defra engaged directly with large trade associations, logistics organisations, border operators and directly with businesses of all sizes to cover a wide range of audience insight, facilitating effective policy design.
After the publication of the final BTOM on 29 August 2023, Defra began an intensive programme of engagement and communications to deliver trader preparedness for both 31 January 2024 and 30 April 2024 milestones. This work included monthly sector focused webinars that are recorded and hosted on YouTube, digestible content leaflets on gov.uk to support traders in preparing, EU focused activity and translations to ensure whole supply chain readiness.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will take steps to enhance the monitoring of industrial pollution from (a) the new power station, (b) the Grundon energy from waste plant in Colnbrook and (c) other sites in Slough.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Industrial activities in England are regulated under the Environmental Permitting Regulations (England and Wales) 2016. All large industrial facilities, such as large combustion plants and energy from waste, are regulated by the Environment Agency (EA) and 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 BAT approach ensures standards are enhanced over time by defining the available techniques which are the best for preventing or minimising emissions and impacts on the environment.
The EA inspects and audits industrial installations to ensure they are complying with the requirements of their permits. For example, energy from waste sites have continuous air emissions monitoring for key pollutants which all plants must carry out. Smaller sites are regulated by local authorities. Control and monitoring requirements of emissions to air are set through a BAT approach which informs permit requirements.
The EA has confirmed that the current monitoring of industrial pollution of the sites it regulates in Slough meets all of the requirements set out in the Industrial Emissions Directive. There is an accreditation standard for monitoring of all industrial emissions.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent steps his Department has taken to (a) improve recycling infrastructure and (b) reduce plastic waste exports.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In the Resources and Waste Strategy, we have committed to taking actions which will help to stimulate private investment in reprocessing and recycling infrastructure.
We are introducing Collection and Packaging Reforms made up of Extended Producer Responsibility for packaging, Simpler Recycling and a Deposit Return Scheme for drinks containers. Through these reforms we want to significantly increase domestic reprocessing and recycling capacity by both increasing investors’ confidence and improving the competitiveness of UK reprocessing.
Our existing Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Regulations have led to investment in waste infrastructure to process end of life electrical and electronic equipment.
We encourage the development of infrastructure for plastic reprocessing to ensure the UK meets its recycling targets as well as supporting these collection and packaging reforms.
Additionally, HM Treasury’s plastic packaging tax is expected to increase demand for secondary material plastic and increasing reprocessing infrastructure will help meet this demand. Reprocessing infrastructure enables the value of resource use to be maximised as well as waste arisings and its impact on the environment to be minimised.
These actions are all intended to increase the amount of plastic waste we recycle domestically so we can reduce our dependency on plastic waste exports.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when he plans to publish the National Action Plan for the Sustainable Use of Pesticides.
Answered by Mark Spencer
We will publish the National Action Plan for the Sustainable Use of Pesticides (NAP) shortly. It will set out Defra’s ambition to minimise the risks and impacts of pesticides to human health and the environment and the actions that need to be taken to deliver those goals.
We have not waited for the publication of the NAP to move forward with work to support sustainable pest management. Defra has recently funded a package of research projects that will bring together scientific evidence underpinning Integrated Pest Management (IPM), a sustainable way of managing pests, in order to look at ways of further encouraging its uptake. This work will support farmers’ access to the most effective IPM tools available and ensure that we understand changing trends in pest threats across the UK.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to support farmers to adopt (a) integrated pest management and (b) other alternative pest management approaches.
Answered by Mark Spencer
The forthcoming UK National Action Plan on the Sustainable Use of Pesticides (NAP) will set out Defra’s ambition to minimise the risks and impacts of pesticides to human health and the environment. Within the NAP we will set out our policies to increase the uptake of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) across all sectors.
We have not waited for the publication of the NAP to move forward with work to support sustainable pest management. We introduced new paid IPM actions within the SFI scheme in 2023. Farmers are now paid to complete an IPM assessment and produce an IPM plan; establish and maintain flower-rich grass margins, blocks, or in-field strips; establish a companion crop and move towards insecticide-free farming. Paid actions for precision application of herbicides will be available from this year.
Defra has recently funded a package of research projects that will bring together scientific evidence underpinning IPM to look at ways of further encouraging its uptake. This work will support farmers’ access to the most effective IPM tools available and ensure that we understand changing trends in pest threats across the UK.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
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 potential impact of permitted pesticides on pollinator populations in England.
Answered by Mark Spencer
The Government’s first priority with regard to pesticides is to ensure that they will not harm people or pose unacceptable risks to the environment.
Defra funds research projects examining the impacts of pesticide use on honeybees and the environment. As part of the National Honey Monitoring Scheme, we fund the analysis of honey samples aimed at assessing levels of pesticides in honey across England, Wales, and Scotland. This provides an estimated level of honeybee exposure to pesticides across different land uses.
In addition, Defra contributes funding to the Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (POMS) which tracks changes in pollinator numbers, including the abundance of bees, hoverflies, and other flower-visiting insects across the UK.
Pollinators are a priority for this government, and we are taking action alongside many partners to implement the National Pollinator Strategy’s provisions. The National Pollinator Strategy Action Plan was published in May 2022 and sets out more specifically how we will continue to act to fulfil the vision, aims and objectives of the Strategy, over the period 2021-2024.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to (a) monitor and (b) ensure compliance with pesticide regulations.
Answered by Mark Spencer
A pesticide may only be placed on the market in GB if the product has been authorised by the GB regulator, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), following a thorough scientific risk assessment, that concludes all safety standards are met. Pesticides that pose unacceptable risks are not authorised. Pesticide authorisations normally set conditions on the use of the pesticide. Pesticide users are also required to have relevant training and for the equipment they use to be tested regularly.
The HSE undertakes compliance and enforcement activities, to ensure that where pesticides are used, they are used safely and in accordance with the law. The supply of professional pesticide products and the use of pesticides in agriculture, horticulture, and parts of the amenity sector is enforced by HSE’s Pesticide Enforcement Officers, following a risk-based approach to compliance established under the Official Controls (Plant Protection Products) Regulations 2020.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of inspection fees on food from (a) Eastern Europe and (b) other countries under the Border Target Operating Model on the cost of food.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Our analysis has shown a minimal impact on food prices and consumers. Our new risk-based model has been designed to minimise costs for traders and consumers. Government analysis estimates the cost of the new model to be £330m per annum overall, across all EU imports. Traders will save around £520m per annum versus the model originally proposed, while the inflationary impacts on food for consumers will be, at most, less than 0.2 percentage points over a 3-year period.