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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make it her policy to issue guidance for homeowners who discover bats in their property.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

All bats, including their breeding sites and resting places, are protected under UK and international law. This strict legal protection makes it an offence to deliberately capture, injure, or kill bats; to damage or destroy a breeding or resting place; or to obstruct access to a resting or sheltering place.

Guidance on what steps to take if you find bats in your home can be found at Bats: protection and licences - GOV.UK. Natural England are currently reviewing their existing guidance around bats to ensure it is up-to-date, accessible and easy to navigate - supporting both homeowners and bats.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will publish a list of schemes where fines levied against water companies (a) have been reinvested to clean up UK waters and (b) are programmed to be reinvested to clean up UK waters, since the spending review in October 2023.

Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

In June this Government announced that fines and penalties levied against water companies for environmental breaches, will be reinvested into future local environmental projects across the country to clean up our rivers, lakes and seas. These could include local environmental programmes to address pollution and improve water quality. Further details about the projects and programmes to be funded will be confirmed in due course.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate her Department has made of the total amount received from water companies in (a) fines and (b) penalties since the Spending Review 2023; and what steps she has taken to ensure that the funds have been allocated to projects to improve water standards.

Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

£109 million in fines and penalties has been applied against water companies since October 2023. This includes the £104.5 million fine issued by Ofwat to Thames Water for breaches of rules relating to the company’s wastewater operations.

In June this Government announced that fines and penalties levied against water companies since October 2023, as well as future fines and penalties, will be reinvested into future local environmental projects across the country to clean up our rivers, lakes and seas. Further details about the projects and programmes to be funded by these water company fines onwards will be announced in due course.

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of allowing incidental off-sales of beer and cider from draught duty paid containers on pubs in rural communities.

Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)

Draught beer and cider now pay 13.9% less in duty than their packaged equivalents – an increase of over 50% on the previous draught discount of 9.2%. This took a penny of duty off a typical strength pint.

The core objective of this relief is to recognise the cultural importance of pubs and other on-trade venues as community hubs and to encourage responsible drinking in supervised settings.

To ensure this relief is targeted at the on-trade, it is prohibited to repackage products that have received Draught Relief for off-site consumption. It is the intention that beverages that are sold to be consumed off site should pay the full rate of duty like their equivalents sold in off-trade venues.

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, whether he has made representations to his Saudi counterpart on the cases of seven Egyptian nationals facing execution for non-lethal drug offences.

Answered by Hamish Falconer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

The UK strongly opposes the death penalty in all countries and circumstances. We regularly discuss human rights with the Saudi authorities, including individual cases of concern. I raised the cases of several Egyptian nationals with the Saudi authorities this year. The Government will continue to engage on this matter.

Water bills

National inquiry into child sexual exploitation

Fruit and Vegetable Aid Scheme

Elon Musk at the Unite the Kingdom rally

Fly camping in the Lake District

Provision of trained Family Liaison Officers

Police officers

This is the first time the Border Security Commander will be appearing before the Committee to answer questions about his role in implementing Government policy on combatting organised immigration crime.

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