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 17 June 2020 to Written Question 60862, if he will commit to undertaking an impact assessment on the decision to require import certificates on wine from 1 January 2021 on (a) UK wine exporters, (b) UK wine importers, (c) UK wine consumers and (d) the hospitality industry.

The European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 will transfer existing EU wine regulations, including import certification requirements, onto the UK statute book. This will mean that EU wines will become subject to the same import requirements as wine arriving from countries like Australia, USA, Chile and South Africa, which currently account for 50% of wine on UK shelves. There are no plans to carry out an impact assessment of what this change will mean for EU wine imports or to estimate the effect it will have on Exchequer receipts. The Wine and Spirit Trade Association has estimated that the cost of fulfilling new import certification arrangements would add approximately 10 pence to each bottle of EU wine, which equates to less than a 2% increase on an average priced wine.