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 the fashion industry to improve the clarity of information and labelling on the sustainability of clothing.

In the Resources and Waste Strategy the Government committed to providing consumers with better information on the sustainability of their purchases, including through better product labelling. In the Environment Bill, currently being taken through Parliament, we are seeking powers that will enable us to introduce labelling and information requirements for clothing, as well as eco-design requirements and producer responsibility schemes.

We have also worked closely with WRAP to develop the new voluntary agreement on textiles to succeed the Sustainable Clothing Action Plan (SCAP 2020) from next year. Textiles 2030 was announced on 10 November and has ambitious targets, aligning with global goals on carbon, water and circularity and aims to drive the shift to a more resource-efficient textiles sector in the UK. Signatories will take action to improve the sustainability of their products in line with the ambitions of the new agreement.

We plan to publish our draft Waste Prevention Programme for consultation in the new year which will set out this Government’s approach to improving resource efficiency and reduce waste in a number of key sectors including textiles.