Asked by: Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party - Dundee East)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much her Department has spent on radio adverts in each of the the last five years broken down by radio station.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is strongly supportive of the radio sector and recognises the great value that it offers to communities across the UK. Radio plays an important role in our cross channel strategy, with the merits of its use being assessed in relation to this.
Government public information campaigns utilise a wide range of channels to maximise reach and engagement and to ensure our messaging reaches as many people as possible, including radio. The Government runs a number of campaigns across all media channels. The channels selected for government paid marketing campaigns are driven by the target audience.
Evaluating the effectiveness of Government communications is paramount to its success. Therefore, no matter the form of communication, we constantly and regularly evaluate our campaigns to ensure effectiveness and value for money.
Total spend on radio advertising from the department over the past five years is £284,110.16.
Asked by: Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party - Dundee East)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many officials in their Department are working on Retained EU Law legislation.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Coordinating work related to the proposed Retained EU Law (Reform and Revocation) Bill is spread across several teams in Defra, with cumulative staff time spent on this work amounting to approximately three FTE officials. In addition, Defra policy officials and legal officials are supporting this work as part of their normal business activities.
Asked by: Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party - Dundee East)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the Government plans to seek mutual recognition of geographical indicators with the EU.
Answered by David Rutley - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government recognises the economic and cultural importance of UK geographical indications (GIs).
The protection of UK GIs in the EU and EU GIs in the UK is subject to ongoing negotiations, and we are working as quickly as possible to come to a solution. However, we anticipate that all current UK GIs will continue to be protected by the EU’s GI schemes after we leave the EU.
We will use the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 to ensure GI schemes for wines, aromatised wines, spirit drinks, agricultural products and foodstuffs are in place once the UK is no longer bound by EU law. This will provide UK protection for UK GIs when we leave the EU and ensure that the UK fulfils its obligations under World Trade Organisation Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights rules.
Asked by: Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party - Dundee East)
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 costs incurred by his Department in the current financial year in preparation for the UK leaving the EU.
Answered by George Eustice
Like all departments, Defra is planning for a number of scenarios for the UK’s departure from the EU to make sure we are ready on Day 1. Over £250m of additional funding has been approved across a number of departments, including Defra, in 2017/18 to make necessary preparations. Additional funding received from the reserve for 2017/8 will be set out at Supplementary Estimates. The costs of EU Exit in 2018-19 will be affected by negotiations over the coming months.