Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether her Department has considered the merits of allowing small-scale organic importers to use importers knowledge statement's rather than certificates of inspections when importing goods.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Organics are within scope of the EU-SPS Agreement, and subject to ongoing negotiations. The Government is considering the impact of all changes, including seeking independent advice and working closely with organic stakeholders. Certificates of inspection are a regulatory requirement to ensure full traceability and integrity of imported organic products and the ingredients in them. There is no scope to remove requirements for any group of businesses as this would result in loss of organic integrity.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of exempting micro-businesses from incoming regulations on the import of organic wines.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Organics are within scope of the EU-SPS Agreement, and subject to ongoing negotiations. The Government is considering the impact of all changes, including seeking independent advice and working closely with organic stakeholders. Certificates of inspection are a regulatory requirement to ensure full traceability and integrity of imported organic products and the ingredients in them. There is no scope to remove requirements for any group of businesses as this would result in loss of organic integrity.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of making all importers of organic wine register as organic businesses in the UK by February 2027.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Organics are within scope of the EU-SPS Agreement, and subject to ongoing negotiations. The Government is considering the impact of all changes, including seeking independent advice and working closely with organic stakeholders. Certificates of inspection are a regulatory requirement to ensure full traceability and integrity of imported organic products and the ingredients in them. There is no scope to remove requirements for any group of businesses as this would result in loss of organic integrity.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress she has made on developing an improved plant health alert system; and whether the new system will include real time updates on border holds.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
For goods that are detained at the border, there are already measures in place to inform the persons responsible for the loads that corrective action may be required or that in the event of a pest finding, certain processes need to be followed. Any non-compliance that results in statutory action is also formally notified to the exporting country, with publication of the non-compliances also published on the Plant Health Portal. Following recent feedback from individual cases, the Animal and Plant Health Agency has reviewed and updated its processes to ensure individuals are aware of any action being taken.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of the protections under section 1(3A) of the Dogs (Protection of Livestock) Act 1953 for livestock and farmers where livestock have strayed onto a road or path.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The Dogs (Protection of Livestock) Act 1953, as amended, covers livestock worrying incidents that take place on roads and paths, such as when animals are being moved from one field to another or where the person in charge of the dog causes it to attack straying livestock on a road or path.
This offers a proportionate balance between protecting livestock and ensuring dog owners are not unfairly criminalised in situations where livestock have escaped their enclosures. Farmers remain responsible for taking reasonable steps to prevent livestock from straying.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the current period of prolonged frost and frozen ground on the ability of woodcock to feed; and whether she intends to exercise existing powers to introduce a temporary suspension of woodcock shooting during this period.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Managed by JNCC, the Severe Weather Scheme is designed to help with the conservation of birds listed at Schedule 2 Part 1 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, including woodcock, by reducing disturbance during periods of prolonged cold weather through voluntary restraint and then statutory suspension of shooting.
The threshold for the minimum number of days of freezing weather which would trigger voluntary restraint in England has not been met this winter. However, JNCC remains in regular discussion with Defra, the British Association of Shooting and Conservation, and environmental organisations on the impact to birds of the current and forecast cold weather.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether her Department remains committed to (a) the application of the precautionary principle in environmental decision-making and (b) maintaining existing statutory protections for protected and priority species in full.
Answered by Mary Creagh
Under the Environment Act 2021 Ministers of the Crown must have due regard to the Environmental Principles Policy Statement when making policy. The statement sets out how to interpret and apply five environmental principles - integration, prevention, rectification at source, polluter pays, and the precautionary principle. This is in addition to any application of the precautionary principle required by specific measures or regulatory regimes, for example, in Article 1 of the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) regulations (EC 1907/2006).
Defra remains committed to maintaining protections for protected and priority species. We will not weaken the UK’s continued support for, and implementation of, our international commitments such as the Bern Convention.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she plans to require local planning authorities to publish biodiversity net gain data and monitoring outcomes for developments in their area.
Answered by Mary Creagh
The Environment Act 2021 established a strengthened biodiversity duty, which requires local planning authorities to publish a biodiversity report at least every 5 years, setting out how they have complied with the duty. As part of this report, local planning authorities are required to include actions they have taken under biodiversity net gain obligations, and information from the biodiversity gain plans they have approved. The first reports must be published by 1 January 2026.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she plans to review the current exemptions from the biodiversity net gain requirement, including the use of the de minimis category.
Answered by Mary Creagh
The Government recently consulted on options to improve the implementation of biodiversity net gain for minor, medium and brownfield development. This included potential changes to the BNG de minimis exemption. A Government response to the consultation will be published in due course.
Asked by: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many countryside stewardship agreements are due to conclude without replacement in Rutland and Stamford constituency in the next year.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
We are aware of the concerns raised by farmers and stakeholders regarding farmers whose current agreements expire at the end of the year and are considering how we can support the continued delivery of environmental outcomes through environmental land management schemes.