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

To ask His Majesty's Government what recent assessment they have made of the ecological and environmental damage caused by the collision between two ships in the North Sea on 10 March.

Defra worked with multiple organisations, including the Centre of Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Cefas). Cefas’s Premiam Monitoring Coordination Cell (PMCC) was set up immediately following this incident. This cell implements post-incident monitoring to assess the impacts of marine pollution incidents and as part of this, shellfish (seafood) and seawater samples were collected in the days and weeks following the incident. The analysis from these samples has indicated that there were no significant adverse ecological or environmental impacts due to fuel or chemicals released from either vessel, or during the response to the incident.

Plastic nurdles and burned debris washed ashore along the Lincolnshire and North Norfolk coast following the incident. Large quantities of plastic pollution and debris were recovered from the shoreline and the sea. Work is still ongoing regarding this, with Environment Agency staff regularly visiting affected sites to assess and if necessary, remove newly visible pollution.

The PMCC has now been stood down, but the impacts of this incident are continuously monitored as part of routine ongoing water and environmental sampling in the area.