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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what studies her Department has commissioned or reviewed on the long-term health effects of organophosphates.

In 2000 a research call was made by the [then] Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in collaboration with the Department of Health, the Health & Safety Executive and the Medical Research Council, to address recommendations made by the Committee on Toxicity in its 1999 report, entitled “Organophosphates”. As a result, six research projects were commissioned, together with a seventh on the effects of organophosphates on children, and by in utero exposure.

In subsequent years, this Department commissioned ten other research projects; altogether, the 17 research projects cost £4 million and were considered by the Committee on Toxicity during a scientific literature search carried out for a statement on organophosphates and human health, released in March 2014. This statement focused on whether or not adverse neurological, neuropsychological or neuropsychiatric effects can result from exposure of adults to cholinesterase-inhibiting organophosphates at levels insufficient to cause overt acute poisoning.

In the recent Westminster Hall debate, I agreed to meet members of the Sheep Dip Sufferers Support Group, and to hear their concerns.