Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 increase plastic reprocessing in the UK.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
In the recently published Resources and Waste Strategy, the Government stated its ambition to further improve domestic reprocessing, and committed to several policies to help stimulate investment in UK reprocessing capacity and improve competitiveness. These policies, subject to consultation, include: implementing extended producer responsibility for various waste streams; introducing a deposit return scheme for drinks containers; raising recycling targets for plastic and other types of packaging; implementing a tax on plastic packaging with less than 30% recycled content; and exploring options to ensure fair competition for all reprocessors, including tighter monitoring and enforcement of waste exports.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 the effectiveness of planning laws to protect wildlife habitats.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The key statutory provisions to protect wildlife habitats are set out in the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 (as amended); the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017; the Conservation of Offshore Marine Habitats and Species Regulations 2017; the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006; and the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009. These protections are also reflected in the Government’s National Planning Policy Framework, which, following public consultation, has been amended to offer further protections for ancient woodland and other irreplaceable habitat, while also strengthening requirements for biodiversity net gain.
Defra has undertaken a review of the effectiveness of the regulations that implement the EU Nature Directives in England. The review’s findings were published in March 2012. The review did not identify a need to amend the statutory provisions but led to a number of improvements in regard to implementation.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 Government's 25 Year Environment Plan, what provision there is for short-term protection of (a) bats and (b) other species with life spans of five to eight years; and what steps he plans to take to increase protection for mature hedgerows from developers.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
A wide variety of species are afforded protection under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations (2017) and under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, including all species of bat found in this country. All listed species are covered irrespective of their expected lifespan, which is not a criterion in identifying the need for protection of a species.
Legal protection for hedgerows is provided by the Hedgerows Regulations 1997. These regulations prohibit the removal of most countryside hedgerows (or parts of them) without first seeking approval from the local planning authority, which is required to decide whether a hedgerow is ‘important’ because of its wildlife, landscape, historical (i.e. more than 30 years old) or archaeological value and as such should not be removed.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 Government's 25 Year Environment Plan, what steps he plans to take to ensure that development sites are monitored and levels of biodiversity maintained.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The 25 Year Environment Plan set out our ambitious plans for improving biodiversity by embedding a net gain approach to development. We have already strengthened planning policy and the revised National Planning Policy Framework, published in July, makes it clear that development should provide net gains for biodiversity. We will shortly be consulting on biodiversity net gain through the planning system.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 report entitled Potential Air Quality Impacts of Shale Gas Extraction in the UK, published by his Department in 2018, for what reason the report was compiled in 2015 but not published until 2018.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
This was a routine report by the Air Quality Expert Group (AQEG). Although it was based on an assimilation of evidence that took place in 2015, the report itself was not finalised until 2017. It was prepared alongside other AQEG reports, for example on ultrafine particles and vegetation, which were produced on similar timelines. These reports were released together following publication of the government’s Clean Air Strategy.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
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 currently has any commissioned or compiled reports that have been awaiting publication for over six months.
Answered by George Eustice
The information requested is not held centrally and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what the time frame is for local authorities to (a) respond and (b) take action in regard to a report of an untaxed or abandoned vehicle on a public road.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
Where it appears to a local authority that a vehicle in its area is abandoned, it has a duty to remove the vehicle, unless (in the case of vehicles not on a carriageway) the cost of moving the vehicle to the nearest carriageway would be unreasonably high. There is no statutory definition of ‘abandoned’, and it is for councils to determine whether any particular vehicle has been abandoned.
There is no statutory time frame for responding to reports of abandoned vehicles. Where a vehicle is abandoned on land that is ‘occupied’, the local authority must give the occupier 15 days’ notice that it proposes to remove the vehicle. The local authority is not entitled to remove the vehicle if the occupier objects to the proposal within that period. If the occupier gives the local authority permission to remove the vehicle during this 15-day period, the vehicle may be removed immediately, but there is no statutory time-frame for doing so.
It is up to councils to decide how best to meet their statutory duties in respect of abandoned vehicles, and how to prioritise this against other local services.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when he expects to reply to my letter of 3 August 2017, requesting a meeting following my earlier question to the Prime Minister on flooding.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
Your letter addressed to the Secretary of State has now been responded to.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what guidance his Department has issued to pest control departments of local authorities on infestations of non-protected bee species in (a) residential and (b) commercial properties.
Answered by George Eustice
Defra has not provided specific advice to pest control departments of local authorities on infestations of non-protected species.
UK Government advice on pest control is available on our website: www.gov.uk/pest-control-on-your-property. This provides links to more detailed guidance produced by the British Pest Control Association, which includes advice on controlling bees and other insects.
Asked by: Rosie Cooper (Labour - West Lancashire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when her Department plans to announce its final decision on the allocation of grant funding to flood risk management authorities in response to the floods of Boxing Day 2015.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
We are investing a record £2.5 billion to better protect 300,000 more properties from flooding by 2021.
At Budget 2016, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a £700 million increase in flood defence and resilience spending. £532m has been allocated to new defences, additional maintenance, new temporary defences and incident management equipment.
Any further allocations will be made by HM Treasury.