Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool Walton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what further legislative actions her Department is considering to mandate or ban the use of specific breeds of chicken in UK farming.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
There are currently no plans to mandate or ban the use of specific breeds of chicken. As set out in the Animal Welfare Strategy, the government is considering how it can support voluntary efforts to move away from the use of fast-growing meat chicken breeds.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool Walton)
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 scale of the use of fast-growing chicken breeds in the UK, both in terms of UK farming and UK retail sales.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Current estimates are that around 95% of meat chickens in the UK are fast growing breeds. The Department has not assessed the scale of the use of fast-growing chicken breeds in the UK in terms of UK retail sales.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool Walton)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps his Department has taken and plans to take to support rescue efforts and humanitarian relief following the flooding on the Nepal-Tibet border.
Answered by Chris Elmore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The UK is providing up to £5 million to support the most urgent humanitarian needs in Nepal, announced on 27 August by the Prime Minister. The funding will support the Government of Nepal's response efforts through a combination of UN, Red Cross and NGO interventions, alongside local and international responders providing emergency assistance. This includes £750,000 through the Red Cross movement for emergency assistance such as clean water, shelter and medical support; £1 million through Start Fund Nepal to help local organisations deliver lifesaving aid; £3 million through the UN to meet urgent humanitarian needs including shelter, WASH and Protection; and up to £250,000 to deploy UK humanitarian experts to strengthen coordination and the effective delivery of assistance. The UK has also deployed specialist humanitarian experts to Nepal to support and coordinate the response efforts. Following the floods, the Minister for the Indo-Pacific visited Nepal to meet with the Nepalese government, UN and other agencies.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool Walton)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the level of risk of further humanitarian disasters due to flooding around the Nepal-Tibet border 1) in the rest of 2026 and 2) in future years.
Answered by Chris Elmore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) considers there to be a significant risk of further flooding in the high-mountain terrain along the Nepal-China border throughout the remainder of this year's monsoon season. This risk is likely to reduce during the colder, generally drier months of October to December. FCDO assesses that further landslide-related floods are possible during the remainder of this year, including as a result of the formation and sudden failure of barrier lakes. FCDO also assesses that there is a significant risk of flooding in future years. The scale of the humanitarian impact of flooding events would depend on their precise location, the size and density of population in the affected areas, and the effectiveness of monitoring, early warning systems and emergency preparedness.