Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment her Department has made of progress on achieving an ecologically-coherent network of marine protected areas in UK seas.

The Government is committed to creating a Blue Belt of Marine Protected Areas around our coast. In February 2014 the Joint Nature Conservation Committee published an assessment of remaining gaps in the Marine Protected Area network in the waters for which the Secretary of State is responsible (around England and offshore waters of Wales and Northern Ireland). It can be viewed at: http://jncc.defra.gov.uk/pdf/140224_BigGapsMethod_v8.pdf).

This analysis is being updated, and will be published in due course.

I have also recently consulted on designating a second tranche of Marine Conservation Zones in English waters.