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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress his Department has made on the development of a national chemicals strategy.

Work on the Chemicals Strategy (CS) started in the summer of 2019. A broad programme of stakeholder engagement is underway to help shape the vision and scope of the CS. To date, we have engaged with interested stakeholders from industry representatives to academia to voluntary organisations.

We will publish a Call for Evidence in the spring to seek views on the safe and effective management of chemicals. This will be published on Defra’s website. It will help inform the development of a draft CS for consultation.