Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of the number of vets available to carry out veterinary checks on the imports of animal products arriving in the UK.
Answered by Mark Spencer
GB Border Control Point (BCP) operators are required to provide sufficient on-site staff, including Official Veterinarians where necessary, to carry out required import checks. BCP designations are only granted where there is evidence that vet capacity will meet demand. BCPs are also regularly audited by the Animal and Plant Health Agency to ensure they continue to have the correct levels of staffing to deliver import controls on products of animal origin.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many registered vets are there who are qualified to carry out import checks on animal products arriving in the UK.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Official Veterinarians (OVs) are used by both the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) and Port Health Authorities to carry out checks on imports that are required of them, and some of that OV resource is recruited on a contractual basis. We do not hold data for the number of registered OVs in the UK able to perform such functions. However, Border Control Post (BCP) designations are only granted where there is evidence that vet capacity will meet demand. BCPs are also regularly audited by APHA to ensure they continue to have the correct levels of staffing to deliver import controls on products of animal origin.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of the availability of commercial loans for businesses in the poultry sector.
Answered by Mark Spencer
The UK has a highly resilient food supply chain which has coped well in responding to the unprecedented challenges the industry has faced in the past few years.
The UK poultry industry operates in an open market and commercial loans are a matter for individual businesses.
The British Business Bank works with lenders to offer a range of debt and equity products to support UK businesses including those in the food and agricultural sectors.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the financial impact on reptile owners of the changes proposed to regulations by her Department on the health risk of importing reptiles from the EU.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Live animals are inherently high risk. They cannot be kept in sealed containers and some of them pose not only a potential animal health risk but also a risk for the environment in the case of non-native species or invasive pests and a risk to the trade on endangered species (for example reptiles).
Movements of reptiles from Europe currently benefit from a transitional period during which reptile importers have free movement that applied prior to EU exit. As set out in the draft Target Operating Model, later in 2024 we expect all checks on reptiles (except pet animals) to be carried out at a live animal Border Control Post (BCP), as they become operational. Defra has not made any financial impact assessment on imports of reptiles.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, for what reason live reptiles imports from the EU have been moved from Low to High Risk under the Target Operating Model method.
Answered by Mark Spencer
Live animals are inherently high risk; they cannot be kept in sealed consignments and some of them pose not only a potential animal health risk but also a risk for the environment in the case of non-native species or invasive pests, and a risk to the trade on endangered species. Later in 2024 we expect all checks on live animals (except pet animals) to be carried out at a live animal Border Control Post, as they become operational.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the cost to the public purse was of the construction of border control points in the UK in the last five years.
Answered by Mark Spencer
£200 million has been spent by HM Government as Port Infrastructure Fund. While much of this went towards the creation of Border Control Posts (BCPs), other facilities were also built (e.g. Border Force, site infrastructure enhancements).
£13.02 million has been spent by Defra on the Sevington BCP, including costs for construction and fixture & fittings, in financial year (FY) 2021/22 & FY 2022/23 to August.
£22.09 million has been spent by Defra on the Dover sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) BCP which covers FY 2021/22 & FY 2022/23 construction to the end of August.
No construction work has yet begun on BCPs in Wales. The Welsh Government is awaiting finalisation of the Target Operating Model before committing to construction contracts.
A total of £15.3 million capital, £16.4 million resource and £1.7 million depreciation has been expended to the end of August 2022 on the provision of the infrastructure, IT systems and personnel for the work necessary to carry out the required SPS checks at Northern Ireland's Points of Entry as a result of the implementation of the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
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 help ensure that untreated sewage is not discharged into the River Thames.
Answered by Mark Spencer
The amount of sewage discharges by water companies is unacceptable. £1.9 billion has been invested in the Thames Tideway Tunnel, which will be completed in 2025. This project will be the largest privately funded infrastructure project in Europe. The tunnel and other improvements will reduce the annual volume of untreated wastewater entering the tidal Thames by 95%, protecting biodiversity and the public health of river users.