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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many packaging producers have been reported by packaging producer compliance schemes for not meeting their packaging recycling note obligations in each of the last five years; and how many of those reports have been investigated.

Between December 2013 and 18 December 2018, 70 suspected packaging freeriders were reported to the Environment Agency by approved packaging compliance schemes.

All reported freeriders have initially been assessed to establish a risk profile.

64 of the 70 reported freeriders have been subject to further investigation. Of the remaining 6, 2 were found to already be registered and the remaining 4 were considered a low risk.