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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 16 May 2022 to Question 276, what specific activities have been undertaken in each category within that Answer; and if she will provide a breakdown of how the funds provided to each activity were allocated.

The import controls introduced in January 2021 and January 2022 were vital first steps in ensuring our biosecurity, which remains our priority objective. The activities previously reported were preparatory for the introduction of further import controls. This expenditure set out below allows us to deliver those import controls that will now be introduced as part of a new target operating model to be published this autumn.

Port Health Authority Fund

This funding was for grants to local authorities in England, to provide the funding they require to deliver new sanitary checks on imports of animal products from territories subject to special transitional import arrangements (EEA states, the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Switzerland) that were due to be introduced from July 2022. The funding covers three types of costs that will be incurred by local authorities:

• Salary costs of recruited staff, to enable authorities to retain them in post
• Recruitment and salary costs for new staff where required and agreed
• Certain non-staff costs relating to accommodation, equipment, and systems

The PHA fund received their budgets through the section 31 grant process which is a non-ringfenced grant to local authorities.

Imports policy

This covers Full Time Equivalent Defra staffing costs, which included some contractors.

IPAFFS

This IT development work was conducted by a third-party supplier specialising in software development, to build a replacement Imports system to the European system (TRACES)

Infrastructure

£12.67 million has been spent by Defra on the Sevington BCP includes costs for Construction and Refurbishment.

£15.20 million has been spent by Defra on the Dover SPS BCP, which includes costs for Construction and Refurbishment.

Other Infrastructure costs that were incurred by Defra in FY 21/22 were for Consultancy and Legal Fees (£0.65m*), Fixtures, Fittings and Equipment (£0.3m*) and Defra Staff (£2.17m*) which included, specialist temporary contractor expertise to deliver this complex project.

* Some rounding errors exist