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 control the grey squirrel population.

In March this year the Government put in place the Invasive Alien Species (Enforcement and Permitting) Order 2019. Under the Order, listed invasive species including the grey squirrel cannot be imported, kept, bred, transported, sold, used or exchanged, allowed to reproduce, or released into the environment. To support implementation of the Order we will shortly be consulting on management measures for widely spread invasive non-native species in England and Wales, including the grey squirrel.

We continue to work with stakeholders under the UK Squirrel Accord, which aims to promote partnership working to protect our red squirrels and woodlands from the damage caused by grey squirrels. Under the joint grey squirrel action plan for England, Defra and the Forestry Commission remain committed to working with land owners and others on measures to support targeted grey squirrel control, for example, through additional measures in forestry options of Countryside Stewardship, as well as through research and taking action on the Forestry Commission’s own land holding (the public forest estate).

Defra continues to support research by the Animal Plant and Health Agency to test the potential of fertility control to reduce local grey squirrel populations.