Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 food waste.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK is an international leader on tackling food waste. We are fully committed to meeting the UN Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 target, which seeks to halve global food waste at consumer and retail levels by 2030. Through our new £15 million farm surplus fund, this Government is working with food producers and charities ensure more produce gets to those who need it most.
We know that action is required across the supply chain and in people’s homes. To tackle food waste, we fund the groundbreaking UK Food and Drink Pact, a voluntary agreement with industry managed by the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP). Action through the Pact includes working with businesses to identify and reduce food waste, as well as campaigns aimed at raising public awareness of food waste and the steps we can all take to help reduce it.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 plans to consult on a statutory target for food production self-sufficiency.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner
Our ambitious food strategy will set and deliver clear long-term outcomes that create a healthier, fairer, and more resilient food system. The food strategy will consider the critical role that domestic production plays in our food security. We are developing a programme of stakeholder engagement to inform the strategy, that will include industry, civil society and consumer group representatives. We will consider the need for statutory targets as we develop the strategy.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 improve the water quality of rivers in South Shropshire constituency.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Cleaning up England’s rivers, lakes and seas is a priority for the Government. The Government has taken immediate and substantive action to address the performance of water companies who are not delivering for the environment or their customers.
That is why we are placing water companies under special measures through the Water (Special Measures) Act. The Act will drive meaningful improvements in the performance and culture of the water industry as a first important step in enabling wider, transformative change across the water sector.
The Environment Agency (EA) has strengthened its regulatory approach, to ensure that water companies and the farmers who pollute our waterways are held accountable. This has seen an increase in the inspections at Severn Trent sewage assets from 707 in 2024/25 to 1742 in 2025/26 and nationally over 3,400 farm inspections taking place during the first three quarters of the 2024/25 fiscal year. Farm inspections are targeted to areas of the greatest risk, including in the River Clun and Teme catchments. The EA have also installed innovative automatic water quality sampling technology at Ludlow, as part of a trial aimed at identifying sources of poor bathing water quality and recommend actions to improve it.
For Price Review 24 (PR24), which runs from 2025-2030, Severn Trent Water will also be investing £1.7 billion to reduce the use of storm overflows. This investment will reduce storm overflow spills by 26% over the five year period. In addition to the PR24 investment, for high spilling sites, Severn Trent Water must produce a spill reduction plan as required by the Environment Act 2021. Where the EA identifies non-compliance, it will not hesitate in taking enforcement action.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 take steps to focus public sector procurement on locally produced food.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner
The new national procurement policy statement sets out requirements for Government contracts, favouring high-quality products that we believe British producers are well-placed to supply, aiding our ambition for half of food supplied into public sector catering to be from local producers or those certified to higher environmental standards.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 support (a) prevention and (b) recovery efforts by local flood action groups.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government’s new Flood Resilience Taskforce brings together representatives from national, regional and local government, the emergency services, and the third sector to improve co-ordination between organisations working on floods resilience so they can put in the support that the public needs and bolsters the nation’s floods resilience. The National Flood Forum, who support many local flood action groups, are a key member of our Flood Resilience Taskforce.
I recently met with the Chair and CEO of the National Flood Forum. We explored how their work to establish and support local flood action groups can be further promoted via the Taskforce.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to help (a) mitigate the impact of and (b) reduce the quantity of microplastics released into the environment by domestic washing machines.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is concerned about the risks microplastics in our water environment may pose to public health and to the environment. Regulations for products and appliances are covered by the Ecodesign for Energy-Related Products Regulations 2010 and are routinely reviewed by the Government, and previous collaborative work with the water industry found that microplastics from clothing and textiles make up a small proportion (around 1%) of the total microplastics found within wastewater treatment works. There is no work planned to amend the relevant regulation for this product at the present time. Defra is continuing to work with water companies to investigate microplastics detected during wastewater treatment and their potential to enter the receiving aquatic environment.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when he plans to respond to Question 25742 tabled by the hon. Member for South Shropshire on 22 January 2025.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
An answer to Question 25742 is being prepared and will be provided as soon as possible.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 improve water quality at (a) the River Teme and (b) other bathing sites.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
For too long, water companies have discharged unacceptable levels of sewage into our rivers, lakes and seas.
The Water (Special Measures) Bill will drive meaningful improvements in the performance and culture of the water industry as a first important step in enabling wider, transformative change across the water sector. It will also give regulators new powers to take tougher and faster action to crack down on water companies not delivering for customers and the environment.
The Water Industry National Environment Programme and the Storm Overflow Discharge Reduction Plan will reduce water industry impacts on bathing waters in England. As part of the Plan, water companies will have improved all storm overflows discharging near every designated bathing water by 2035.
On 12th November 2024, Defra, jointly with the Welsh Government, announced a consultation on a package of potential reforms to The Bathing Water Regulations 2013. We are currently analysing responses to the Consultation and will publish a response in due course.
The Environment Agency has developed an Action Improvement Plan for the Shropshire bathing water sites to identify actions needed to improve them, as well as trialling novel monitoring approaches on the River Teme at Ludlow to provide greater insight into bathing water quality.
Upstream of Ludlow, the Environment Agency has completed over 80 farm inspections over the last 2 years, ensuring compliance with agricultural regulations and providing advice to reduce farming impacts on our waterways.
Tree planting along rivers can help improve water quality, such as by trapping and removing pollutants from agricultural runoff water before it reaches the river. The England Woodland Creation Offer provides financial support for tree planting and incentivises woodland creation that improves water quality through supplementary payments.
The ‘Woodlands for Water’ project, supported by Defra, has been providing targeted facilitation to support landowners to access tree planting grants to support the creation of riparian woodland corridors, including in the River Teme catchment.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
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 regulation for farmers.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner
Farm regulation provides important protections for the environment, habitats, animals, and public health. For example, it is helping reduce animal disease risk from BtB, avian flu and Foot and Mouth amongst others as we speak, this maintains confidence in our farm produce in both international and domestic markets as well as protecting the profitability of farmers.
If regulation is working well, it should provide clear and fair expectations, allowing farmers to operate their businesses with confidence. However, this is not the case currently with all farm regulation that has been left over to the new Government. This is why I have asked Defra to review farm regulation, focussing on how it can be more coherent, less time consuming and easier to understand for farmers under this new Government. I have also asked all Defra regulators how they are supporting growth.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to help increase agricultural productivity.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner
The Government recognises the importance of innovation in supporting future farming productivity and profitability, to boost Britain’s food security and to improve nature’s recovery.
Defra is continuing to support agricultural productivity through a range of policies. For example, we have already announced the ADOPT Fund which will launch in Spring 2025, enabling farmer-led trials to bridge the gap between new technologies and their real-world application. Legislation to implement the Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023 will be introduced in Parliament before the end of March. When in force, this will enable farmers to grow crops with higher yields and that are more resistant to drought, pests and diseases. Defra also works closely with the Institute for Agriculture and Horticulture (TIAH), a new professional body for the farming industry established in 2021. TIAH aims to remove the fragmentation that exists within current learning and skills landscape for farming and growing businesses enabling the industry to drive greater uptake of professional skills which will help support improvements in productivity.