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 ensure that perfluorooctanoic acid is not used in the manufacture of goods and products; and what assessment he has made of the adequacy of regulations on the use of that acid.

Perfluorooctanoic acid, known as PFOA, its salts and PFOA-related compounds, was listed as a persistent organic pollutant (POP) and banned from use under the UN Stockholm Convention with a number of time-limited specific exemptions at the Conference of Parties in May 2019.

POPs are toxic, persist in the environment, bioaccumulate in humans and animals and have long-ranging properties. The ban on the manufacture, sale and use of PFOA will come into force in July 2020 through the POPs regulation.

The effectiveness of this legislation cannot be assessed until it is in force but UK regulators will be responsible for ensuring that these regulations are adhered to and emissions monitoring will include PFOA.