Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 1 April to 2025 to Question 41338 on Nature Restoration Fund, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of a long term plan to help protect irreplaceable (a) peatlands and (b) ancient woodlands.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This Government is committed to protecting our irreplaceable peatlands. That's why we are investing £400 million to protect and restore nature, including our peatlands and trees including ancient woodlands. We have large ambitions to restore hundreds of thousands of hectares of peatlands across the country, and we are working to ensure that we have the most effective mechanisms in place to go further than we have before.
Defra recently conducted and published a review into how ancient woodland and ancient and veteran trees are protected by the National Planning Policy Framework. This revealed that the policy is not being consistently implemented and we are looking at how this can be improved. Defra is also currently revising the Environmental Improvement Plan, which includes actions to protect ancient woodlands.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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's objectives on support for sustainable farming have changed, in the context of the closure of the SFI scheme.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We have closed Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) for new applications because the current SFI budget has been successfully allocated, with large-scale uptake of the scheme and 37,000 live SFI agreements delivering towards our environmental targets. This will allow us to align SFI with our work on the Land Use Framework and the 25-year farming roadmap to protect the most productive land and boost food security, whilst delivering for nature.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 adequacy of the Rural Payment Agency’s ability to handle the change announced to SFIs this week.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
As the principal sponsor of the RPA, Defra works closely with RPA officials at every level to provide constructive challenge and support on RPA implementation of policy changes. The RPA’s ability to implement policy changes is well understood and comprehensive planning and discussion is undertaken between the RPA and Farming and Countryside Programme to ensure that changes are implemented smoothly, including external communications and customer handling. There is full confidence and understanding of the RPAs ability to handle the recent announcement on the Sustainable Farming Incentive.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 his Department's (a) resources and (b) staff to implement his policies on (i) environment protections and (ii) food security.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Phase 1 of the Spending Review concluded in October last year and set Defra's budget for 2025-26. Phase 2 of the Spending Review is underway and will set our departmental budgets until 2028-29 for RDEL and 2029-30 for CDEL.
All departments are being asked to find savings and efficiencies in their budgets in an effort to ensure all public money is focused on the Government’s priorities. For 2025-26 the department has carried out an intensive exercise to ensure resources and staff have been allocated to priorities, including environmental protection and food security.
Once the department has received its spending review settlement, we will finalise allocations for environmental protection and food security from 2026-27 until 2029-30.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 have discussions with international counterparts on changes to the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (the SPS Agreement) to support (a) zoo animal transfers and (b) commercial farmers; and if he will have discussions with representatives from Shaldon Zoo to discuss the application of the SPS Agreement to the Zoo's work.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures sets the overarching international rules on food safety, animal and plant health. It does not contain specifics on the movement of live animals.
For zoo animal transfers and commercial farm animal movements, Defra works with the officials in the importing country to ensure requirements are practical and achievable. Queries on animal movements can be sent to can be sent to imports@apha.gov.uk or exports@apha.gov.uk, as relevant.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to meet the hon. Member for South Cotswolds to discuss legislative proposals on climate and nature.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
I met with the honourable member for South Cotswolds in January this year.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to meet with campaigners involved with the Climate and Nature Bill.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We regularly meet with campaigners on a wide range of issues, including those who support the Climate and Nature Bill.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 reduce dog bites in the UK.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra continues to work with the police, local authorities and animal welfare groups to explore measures to reduce dog attacks and promote responsible dog ownership across all breeds of dog.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 bring forward legislative proposals to make importing dogs with cropped ears illegal.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government recently announced its support for the Animal Welfare (Import of Dogs, Cats and Ferrets) Bill, a Private Members’ Bill sponsored by the hon. Member for Winchester. The Bill will give the Government powers to prevent the supply of low-welfare pets to the United Kingdom. We will use these powers to prohibit the bringing into Great Britain of dogs with non-exempted mutilations such as cropped ears.
We are fully supportive of this Bill and would like to see it pass through both Houses as soon as Parliamentary time allows.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if his Department will take steps to review its policy on the private ownership model of South West Water.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government has no intention to nationalise water companies, including South West Water. Such a process would significantly stall much needed investment, leaving sewage pollution only to get worse.
Nationalising the water industry would put a huge burden on the public purse and would not fix the root of the problem. Shareholders and debt holders would need to be compensated, which could cost over an estimated £90 billion based on Ofwat’s Regulatory Capital Value (RCV) 2024 figures for companies in England and Wales.
This Government has already shown we will take the necessary action with the introduction of our landmark piece of legislation, the Water (Special Measures) Act, and the Independent Water Commission which will make recommendations to ensure we have a sufficiently robust and stable regulatory framework to attract the investment needed to clean up our waterways, speed up infrastructure delivery and restore public confidence in the sector.