Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much of the Small Abattoir Fund was spent by her Department prior to it's closure in 2024.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Rural Payments Agency have offered agreements for the Smaller Abattoir Fund worth a total of £1,119,347.59.
Smaller Abattoir Fund grants are claimed in arrears and as of 04 November 2025, £593,018.55 has been paid out under the scheme.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to eradicate the Yellow-legged Asian hornet.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra is continuing to follow an eradication strategy against Yellow Legged Hornet (also known as Asian Hornet) to prevent this invasive non-native species from establishing in GB. Contingency action is delivered by the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA). As of 23 October 2025, the APHA have found and destroyed a total of 155 Yellow Legged Hornet nests.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans she has to expand the use of new (a) tracking and (b) monitoring technologies to improve the effectiveness of the National Bee Unit’s work to (i) locate and (ii) eradicate yellow-legged Asian hornet nests.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Since 2016 the Animal and Plant Health Agency’s National Bee Unit (NBU) have responded to incursions of Yellow Legged Hornet (YLH) into Great Britain. The NBU has developed a fine-tuned and effective response which allows them to find and destroy nests to prevent YLH establishing. During 2025 the NBU has drawn on support from other members of staff within APHA and used new technology to deliver the response. For tracking, the inspectors have been trialling Robor Nature Units which use a handheld device to add tiny trackers to hornets. The tracker is then used to follow the hornet and find the nest so it can be destroyed and removed. For monitoring, field tests have been carried out using VespAI, a visual monitoring system developed by the University of Exeter which uses artificial intelligence to carry out surveillance for YLH. As of 23 October 2025, the NBU have found and destroyed a total of 155 Yellow Legged Hornet nests.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she is taking to ensure the availability of seasonal labour for the apple and pear industry.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Seasonal Worker visa route is hugely important for the horticulture sector, including the apple and pear industry. Government made a total of 43,000 seasonal worker visas available for horticulture in 2025. The Government has also announced a 5-year extension to the Seasonal Worker visa route to provide stability and certainty to the horticulture sector, and we can confirm that 41,000 visas will be available for 2026 for the horticulture sector.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans her Department has for the future of the Sustainable Farming Incentive.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra is working closely with farmers and industry stakeholders to design a future Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) offer that will better target the SFI in an orderly way towards our priorities for food, farming and nature. Information and plans for the next iteration of the scheme will be published in due course.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what guidance her Department has issued on the treatment of historic (a) glass and (b) plastic bottles distributed prior to the introduction of the Deposit Return Scheme.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Deposit Return Scheme in England, Northern Ireland and Scotland will include single-use drinks containers from 150ml to 3 litres. Materials included are polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic, steel, and aluminium drink containers. Glass drinks containers across the UK are included in the scope of the Extended Producer Responsibility for Packaging scheme, to make sure it is appropriately and efficiently recycled.
Only DRS containers placed on the market after 1 October 2027 will carry a deposit on them. Containers placed on the market before 1 October 2027 can still be recycled via kerbside collections.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans her Department has to provide additional support to (a) the Somerset Eel Recovery Project and (b) other local recovery projects to enable the (i) delivery of eel passes, (ii) habitat improvements, (iii) increased Assisted migration and (iv) local community engagement work.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In England, the Environment Agency is responsible for eel management and working with local delivery partners.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
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 funding for the (a) Environment Agency and (b) other relevant bodies to (i) monitor and regulate pollution, (ii) assess habitat degradation, (iii) measure silver eel escapement, (iv) ensure that pumps friendly and (v) ensure that barriers are eel friendly.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This is a devolved matter and therefore the information provided relates to England only.
The Environment Agency (EA) are responsible for eel management in England. As a non-departmental public body, the EA determine how to allocate their funding from Defra across their activities. Defra has recently committed £350,000 for research and development projects to drive improvements in eel management and conservation.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will take steps to review England and Wales’ Eel Management Plans (EMPs), in order to accelerate progress towards meeting silver eel escapement targets.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This is a devolved matter and therefore the information provided relates to England only.
The Environment Agency (EA) are responsible for delivering EMPs in England to meet silver eel escapement targets. Defra is not planning to review EMPs at this time as the EA is progressing the delivery of EMPs.
Asked by: Sarah Dyke (Liberal Democrat - Glastonbury and Somerton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she is taking to ensure that all police forces have access to adequate (a) training and (b) resources to (i) identity, (ii) record and (iii) investigate wildlife crime.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra is a principal funder of the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU). In 2025/26, it is providing £424,000 to the Unit. The NWCU helps prevent and detect wildlife crime by obtaining and disseminating intelligence, undertaking analysis which highlights local or national threats and directly assisting law enforcers in their investigations. Last year, the NWCU assisted every single police force in the UK. The NWCU also provides training to police officers across the UK which reflects the National Police Chiefs' Council wildlife crime strategy and provides comprehensive training in wildlife crime policing. This is open to UK police forces and, as an example, all English police forces had at least one officer trained on an NWCU module in 2023/24.