Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when the Government plans to respond to the Dame Glenys Stacey's 2018 Farm Inspection and Regulation Review; and whether any of the recommendations of that Review have been implemented as of 30 March 2022.

The Government has not published a formal response to Dame Glenys Stacey’s Farm Inspection and Regulation Review. However, as we set out in the Agricultural Transition Plan, published in November 2020, we have been using the learnings and recommendations made in the Review to engage with farmers and other experts to design and reform the farming regulatory system.

We have made changes to the way farmers are regulated currently, building on recommendations in the Dame Glenys Stacey Review. We are taking a more proportionate approach to farm payment penalties following a cross compliance inspection, including making more use of warning letters where there is no risk to public or animal health or damage to the environment. We are also providing solutions to improve slurry management through the new Farming Investment Fund and increasing Environment Agency inspections from 400 to at least 4000 a year by 2023, which will provide a proportionate, risk-based focus to address pollution from sources such as slurry.

The Dame Glenys Stacey Review’s most prominent recommendation was for the establishment of a single farm regulator. The Nature Recovery Green Paper, published in March 2022, set out that we are exploring options to organise the Defra group to best deliver long-term targets and commitments to protect and restore the environment, while developing the capability to respond to new and emerging challenges. As part of this exercise, we will assess the recommendation of the Dame Glenys Stacey Review to deliver coherent regulation for the farming sector.

We will continue to use the Dame Glenys Stacey’s Review as we work with farmers and other experts to ensure that the regulatory system supports people to meet standards and enables farms to be sustainable, resilient and competitive. This work will continue throughout the Agricultural Transition period.