Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
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 plans to vaccinate wild bird populations against avian flu.
Answered by Jo Churchill
Defra has no plans to vaccinate the wild bird population against avian influenza.
Defra’s policy on vaccination is set out in the Notifiable Avian Disease Control Strategy for Great Britain and in separate guidance on GOV.UK. Outside of zoos, the vaccination of birds as an immediate disease control response is not currently permitted. High standards of biosecurity, separation of poultry and other captive birds from wild birds, and careful surveillance for signs of disease remain the most effective means of controlling avian influenza.
In practice, existing vaccines can only be administered via injection. This precludes any widespread use in wild birds.
While vaccination can help to reduce mortality, it is likely that some vaccinated birds would still be capable of transmitting avian influenza if they became infected. This would increase the time taken to detect and eradicate the virus.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will take steps to ensure that future policy decisions relating to animal welfare are evidence-based.
Answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury
Defra applies an evidence-based approach to policy decision-making which makes use of several sources. These include:
This year Defra’s research and innovation interests were published, setting out the high-level research aims for Defra policies including with reference to animal welfare. This is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/defra-group-research-and-innovation-interests-2021/defra-group-research-and-innovation-interests
The Animal Sentience Bill currently before Parliament also provides for a new animal sentience committee to issue reports on how well future central government policy decisions pay all due regard to the welfare needs of animals.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to ensure animal welfare policy is incorporated in trade policy.
Answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury
The Government’s manifesto commitment was clear that in all of our trade deals, we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards.
Our Action Plan for Animal Welfare sets out our approach to animal welfare in trade policy and may be found here:
Our approach includes pressing for WTO rules which treat animal welfare criteria as a key consideration in trade discussions and seeking cooperation commitments in our new trade agreements to encourage shifts worldwide towards higher welfare forms of livestock production.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of (a) the efficiency of recycling processes in the UK and (b) the extent to which businesses in the UK source recycled paper products from overseas as opposed to domestic suppliers.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
Defra has not undertaken these assessments.
As set out in the Resources and Waste Strategy, the Government is taking action to encourage investment in recycling and reprocessing infrastructure. The major waste reforms of a Deposit Return Scheme for drinks containers, Extended Producer Responsibility for packaging and Consistency in Recycling, which will be legislated for through powers provided in our landmark Environment Bill, will increase the quality and quantity of secondary materials available for domestic recycling. These reforms will contribute towards continuing to improve the efficiency of recycling processes in the UK.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
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 23 April 2021 to Question 181231, on Poultry: Transport, what plans his Department has to undertake an impact assessment on the transport of day-old chicks for up to 72 hours following the consultation on improvements to animal welfare in transport that closed on 25 February 2021.
Answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury
Our consultation stage impact assessment estimated the potential impact of proposals to end live animal exports for slaughter and fattening and introduce further improvements to animal welfare during transport; this covered all relevant species.
Our aim was to gather additional evidence through the consultation process to further refine the impact assessment. The public consultation ended on 25 February and we are currently analysing all the responses that we received.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what impact assessment his Department has made of the proposed reforms to animal welfare in transport.
Answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury
We published a consultation stage impact assessment which estimated the potential impact on businesses of proposals to end live animal exports for slaughter and fattening and introduce further improvements to animal welfare during transport.
Our aim was to gather additional evidence through the consultation process to further refine the impact assessment. The public consultation ended on 25 February and we are currently analysing all the responses we received.