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

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many statutory instruments from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs have been laid this calendar year; of those, what percentage corrected errors in a previous instrument (including drafts of affirmative instruments that had to be superseded by correcting drafts); and what steps that Department is taking to reduce the need for correcting instruments.

Defra laid 33 Statutory Instruments this calendar year. Two of these, 6% of the total, corrected errors in other Statutory Instruments. They are the Marine Licensing (Application Fees) (Amendment) Regulations 2014 and the Veterinary Medicines (Amendment) Regulations 2014.

The Department and its legal team have standing procedures for checking Statutory Instruments. If a correction to a Defra Statutory Instrument is required, the reasons for the error are investigated and appropriate action taken.

Defra will be working with The Treasury Solicitor and First Parliamentary Counsel in the coming months to improve the quality of Statutory Instrument drafting.