Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of collecting, indefinitely storing and regenerating reproductive cells and cell lines from endangered animal species.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
Global biodiversity is declining at an alarming rate. Whilst we have no plans to make an assessment of the potential merits of collecting, indefinitely storing and regenerating reproductive cells and cell lines from endangered animal species, we remain fully committed to ensuring our most vulnerable biodiversity is protected. This includes by working with countries to agree an ambitious Global Biodiversity Framework at the forthcoming Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of Parties (CoP15) being held in December this year.
Asked by: Kevin Brennan (Labour - Cardiff West)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential cost to UK musicians of placing Pernambuco wood on Appendix 1 of the CITES protected list.
Answered by Scott Mann - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
We are working closely with representatives from the music sector, including the Musicians' Union, the Incorporated Society of Musicians, and the Association of British Orchestras, to understand the potential impact of the proposal submitted to the 19th Conference of the Parties (CoP19) to CITES to include Pernambuco wood in Appendix I.
While the proposal outlines the threats this species faces, we recognise too that this proposal could create significant burdens for industry and UK CITES Authorities. We will continue to engage with the sector and other Parties to ensure that any additional burdens are proportionate to the conservation benefits of the measures agreed.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, on 1 October 2022, how many full time equivalent Border Force personnel were deployed to dedicated teams responsible for preventing and detecting the illegal importation of (a) drugs, (b) excise goods (c) firearms, knives and other offensive weapons, and (d) items in violation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
Border Force resource is deployed not just to carry out essential checks at the border, but also to detect harmful goods and safeguard vulnerable and exploited individuals.
There is not a specific number of mandated checks for Border Force officers to conduct every day. Most checks will be conducted according to risk levels or intelligence.
Border Force does not routinely publish the level of data relating to the number of customs interdictions undertaken by Government officials in the UK, and at specific geographic locations or ports.
However, data, including information related to the seizure of prohibited and restricted goods, is published quarterly on the.gov.uk website.
The latest release of information can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/border-force-transparency-data-q2-2021.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when his Department plans to publish legislation on banning the import and export of hunting trophies.
Answered by Scott Mann - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
We have pledged to ban the import of hunting trophies from thousands of species. HM Government is committed to a ban that is among the strongest in the world and leads the way in protecting endangered animals. We welcome the Private Member's Bill, led by the hon. Member for Crawley, that will deliver this.
Asked by: Ben Lake (Plaid Cymru - Ceredigion)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what his policy is on the proposed bans on the export of live animals for slaughter and the import of hunting trophies; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Scott Mann - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
HM Government recognises the long-standing public concern with live animals being exported for slaughter and fattening, and plans to proceed with a ban on the export of livestock and horses from England, Wales and Scotland for slaughter and fattening, as set out in its response to the public consultation last year. This will be done as soon as soon as Parliamentary time allows.
We have pledged to ban the imports of hunting trophies from thousands of species. HM Government is committed to a ban that is among the strongest in the world and leads the way in protecting endangered animals. We welcome the Private Member’s Bill, led by Henry Smith MP, that will deliver this.
Asked by: Baroness Randerson (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what negotiations are taking place with the governments of (1) France, (2) Belgium and (3) the Netherlands, to designate Eurostar terminals as entry and exit points for items including musical instruments affected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES); what progress they have made in any such negotiations; and, in the absence of any agreement, what steps they are taking to broaden and increase the number of ports of entry to the EU that can be used by UK musicians who are required to obtain a carnet to work in the EU.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Any specimen covered by CITES controls must be imported or exported through one of the 36 designated and operational land, sea and air Points of Entry (PoE). The full list is available at GOV.UK and kept under review.
We are working closely with Border Force, industry and our European counterparts to look at the feasibility of designating further PoE to provide additional routes for the movement of CITES items (e.g. musical instruments), including the Eurostar.
Approximately 80 countries around the world (including all EU member states) accept ATA Carnets. ATA Carnets are not a mandatory requirement for anyone temporarily moving goods between the United Kingdom and the EU, including musicians transporting their instruments. They are an optional facilitation that allows goods to be imported temporarily without the normal customs formalities (i.e. customs declarations) and import duty being paid. They allow a single document to be used for multiple countries’ customs controls. The management of EU import and export procedures is the responsibility of the customs authority of the relevant EU member state.
Asked by: Alex Sobel (Labour (Co-op) - Leeds North West)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when his Department plans to publish the Animals Abroad Bill.
Answered by Scott Mann - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
HM Government takes the welfare of all animals seriously and as set out in our Action Plan for Animal Welfare, we are committed to promoting high animal welfare standards, both at home and abroad. We have an ambitious agenda of animal welfare and conservation reforms, and this includes introducing or supporting legislation for specific reforms.
We have pledged to ban the imports of hunting trophies from thousands of species. HM Government is committed to a ban that is among the strongest in the world and leads the way in protecting endangered animals. We welcome the Private Member’s Bill, led by the hon. Member for Crawley, that will deliver this.
We are also committed to banning the import and export of detached shark fins and shark fin products. This ban will help ensure that shark fins obtained through unsustainable and cruel finning practices are not entering the UK. HM Government is committed to the ban and welcomes the Private Member’s Bill, led by the hon. Member for Neath, on this topic.
Asked by: Daniel Zeichner (Labour - Cambridge)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department plans to extend the list of restricted food items that may enter the UK.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We have existing controls on personal imports from non-EU countries and certain Prohibitions and Restrictions on products of animal origin which cannot be imported into UK - the full list of restrictions can be found on GOV.UK.
We also have controls governing the entry into Great Britain of “High Risk Food (and feed) of Non-Animal Origin” from certain countries. The Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland review the commodities in the Regulation on a regular basis. Following a public consultation, the annexes of the regulation that governs these rules (Retained EU Regulation 2019/1793), are due to be updated in January 2023.
There are procedures in place to introduce safeguard measures which can include restrictions on food items to address biosecurity risks to Great Britain. We have recently introduced new restrictions on pork and pork products from the EU entering Great Britain, as a risk-based and proportionate safeguard measure to mitigate the risk of introducing African swine fever.
We have responsibilities under international treaties such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and any imported food or animal products protected by CITES needs to be accompanied by a CITES permit. We will continue to keep these under review.
Asked by: Pauline Latham (Conservative - Mid Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department has taken to bring forward legislative proposals on banning the import of hunting trophies from endangered species announced in December 2021.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We have pledged to bring forward legislation to ban imports of hunting trophies from thousands of species. This ban will be among the strongest in the world, leading the way in protecting endangered animals. We intend to bring this forward as soon as parliamentary time allows.
Asked by: Pauline Latham (Conservative - Mid Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of the number of hunting trophies from endangered species that have been imported into the UK since December 2019.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK recorded 63 imports of hunting trophies under CITES in 2019 and 26 imports in 2020.
Data for 2021 is currently being finalised and will be made available through the CITES trade database at https://trade.cites.org/.