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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department conducted a comparative review of free farrowing systems in the Uk and other countries in 2020 in response to the recommendation of the Independent Report of the Farm Animal Welfare Committee entitled Opinion on Free Farrowing Systems, published in November 2015.

Defra’s Action Plan for Animal Welfare, published last year, outlined that we would be examining the confinement of farm animals, including the use of farrowing crates for pigs. As part of this examination, we are considering the many different pig production systems, used both in the United Kingdom and in other countries.