Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to his Department’s transparency data Spending over £500 with an electronic purchasing card solution for September 2023, updated on 20 December 2023, what the purpose was of spending £630 with See Tickets on Other Miscellaneous Expenses.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The expenditure of £630 relates to the purchase of 30 tickets to a UK Parliament Multimedia Tour on 9 August 2023. This formed part of a summer internship induction day. The tour gave interns knowledge on the history, heritage and work of UK Parliament today as they begin working for Defra.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to the Fifty-first Report of the Committee of Public Accounts of Session 2022-23 on Tackling Defra’s ageing digital services, HC 737, published on 10 May 2023, what steps his Department has taken to replace legacy computer systems since the publication of that report.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We continue to invest in replacing legacy IT systems, both through the dedicated upgrade programmes and through major programme deliveries.
For example, our Legacy Application Programme is addressing technical debt which includes exiting from old data centres, removing obsolescence, bringing applications into mainstream support, and improving their security posture. Over 180 applications have had their most critical legacy technology addressed through this programme. We are addressing legacy technology in other applications through digital transformation and policy programmes where this provides a better coordinated approach. This approach has enabled us to remediate the most critical legacy technology and continue to remediate priority applications to April 2025.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many flood support officers his Department employed in each of the last five years.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Environment Agency (EA) does not have “flood support officers” as a role. The EA has numerous flood incident response roles that staff hold alongside their day jobs. Staff are regularly trained and exercised in these roles. Some of these roles are only activated during an incident and some are on standby 24/7 365 days a year.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many sewage releases there have been in (a) Sunderland and (b) the Sunderland Central constituency in (i) 2023 and (ii) 2022.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Event Duration Monitoring (EDM) provides information on when and for how long sewage discharges have occurred. All EDM data is published online (opens in a new tab) annually since 2020. The 2022 data was published in March 2023 (opens in a new tab). The full EDM data set for 2023 will be published by the Environment Agency in March 2024.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the risk to public health as a result of the Halliwell Banks Landfill site.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The former Halliwell Banks landfill site falls under the scope of the Part 2a Contaminated Land regime and was designated a “special site” as a result of its potential impact to the groundwater in the Principal Aquifer, the North Sea and the Northumberland Costal Special Protection Area. Following the 2A regime, “Appropriate Persons” with a link to the site have been identified, and, in accordance with the statutory procedure, required to commission a post determination report examining the issues with the site. This report is currently being jointly scrutinised by the Environment Agency and Natural England, who expect to make a determination on its suitability in coming months.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of the potential costs of mitigating potential negative impacts of the Halliwell Banks Landfill site on the surrounding area (a) as at 7 December 2021, (b) in 10 years and (c) in 20 years.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The former Halliwell Banks landfill site falls under the scope of the Part 2a Contaminated Land regime and was designated a “special site” as a result of its potential impact to the groundwater in the Principal Aquifer, the North Sea and the Northumberland Costal Special Protection Area. Following the 2A regime, “Appropriate Persons” with a link to the site have been identified, and, in accordance with the statutory procedure, required to commission a post determination report examining the issues with the site. This report is currently being jointly scrutinised by the Environment Agency and Natural England, who expect to make a determination on its suitability in coming months.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the environmental impact of the Halliwell Banks Landfill site on the surrounding area.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The former Halliwell Banks landfill site falls under the scope of the Part 2a Contaminated Land regime and was designated a “special site” as a result of its potential impact to the groundwater in the Principal Aquifer, the North Sea and the Northumberland Costal Special Protection Area. Following the 2A regime, “Appropriate Persons” with a link to the site have been identified, and, in accordance with the statutory procedure, required to commission a post determination report examining the issues with the site. This report is currently being jointly scrutinised by the Environment Agency and Natural England, who expect to make a determination on its suitability in coming months.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans he has to introduce further standards on companies (a) disposing of waste and (b) disposing of unused or new products in response to Government’s commitment to Net Zero.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government is committed to maximising the value obtained from resources and minimising waste, as stated in our Resources and Waste Strategy 2018. Preventing products becoming waste and enabling reuse is fundamentally important in achieving this, and the climate benefits of doing so are recognised.
Businesses that handle waste are obliged, by the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011, to follow the waste hierarchy. This requires action to prevent waste as the priority option. Failure to meet the legal obligation to take all reasonable steps to apply this can lead to enforcement action, from the Environment Agency in England.
We recently consulted on a new Waste Prevention Programme for England. This builds on the Resources and Waste Strategy and seeks to help with our strategic goals including achieving Net Zero. It included proposals to provide guidance aimed at encouraging the reuse of products and considering the need to clarify the application of the waste hierarchy. We expect to publish our new Programme later this year.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the Waste Regulations 2011.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
A statutory review of The Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011 was published in December 2018, available here:
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2011/988/pdfs/uksiod_20110988_en.pdf
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many enforcement actions have been made under the Waste Regulations 2011 since those regulations came into law; and if he will provide a list of all enforcement actions taken under those regulations.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Environment Agency (EA) has taken 46 enforcement actions under the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011 since they came into force. Alongside these enforcement actions, the EA issues cautions and advice and guidance to operators where appropriate to bring them into legal compliance. The Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011 legislation is one part of the enforcement framework for waste that the EA works under.