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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what legislative proposals on pollution he plans to bring forward in this Parliament.

The Environment Bill will bring forwards legislative proposals for tackling pollution.

It will drive significant environmental improvement and tackle pollution by setting and achieving legally-binding, long-term targets in key areas including air quality, water, and resource efficiency and waste.

Some of the leading measures in the Bill to support the delivery of targets include:

• Air Quality: The Bill introduces a duty on the government to set at least two air quality targets by October 2022:

o To reduce the annual average level of fine particulate matter (PM_2.5) in ambient air

o A further target to improve air quality

• Water: The Bill makes drainage and sewerage management planning, through which companies develop the capacity of their networks, a statutory duty.
• Resource Efficiency and Waste Reduction – The Bill will enable Government to make waste producers cover the cost of collecting and recycling packaging waste, introduce deposit returns schemes, and introduce charges for single-use plastic items.