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19 Mar 2007 : Column 591W—continued
Flood Control: Finance
Miss McIntosh: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs pursuant to the answer of 6 March 2007, Official Report, columns 1824-5W, on flood control: finance, who decided that only certain development studies and coastal monitoring projects would receive new funding. [126406]
Ian Pearson: My letters of 20 December to the Environment Agency, Local Government Association and Association of Drainage Authorities explained that funding for new capital improvement projects and related studies in 2007-08 was severely constrained by the high level of funding commitment to ongoing projects but that I had decided to allocate £2.1 million to fund a review of Shoreline Management Plans, development of strategy plans, and coastal monitoring and other essential studies to allow strategic planning for the investment programme to be strengthened. Total funding from DEFRA to the operating authorities for flood risk management in 2007-08 will be £457 million, excluding spend on coast protection. The letters are published on the DEFRA website and copies have been placed in the Library of the House.
Institute for Public Policy Research
Mr. Heald: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what funding (a) his Department and (b) its predecessor provided to (i) the IPPR and (ii) IPPR Trading Ltd. in each year since May 1997; and for what purpose funding was provided. [124212]
Barry Gardiner: DEFRA came into being in June 2001. From information held centrally, payments to the IPPR are as follows; we do not have a breakdown of funding between IPPR and IPPR Trading Ltd.:
| Financial year | Total (£) |
| (1 )Includes £51,898 to meet the costs of a secondee from IPPR to Defra. (2 )April to December. (3) Includes £11,408 to meet the costs of a secondee from IPPR to Defra. | |
Payments have been for advice on energy, climate and environmental strategy, including environmental pollution; business and strategy; business and transport; business and consumers together with a joint public seminar with DEFRA on India's sustainability challenge.
Land Drainage
Rob Marris: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what (a) strategy and (b) funding the Government have put in place for integrated drainage plans in urban areas (i) to address the risks of sewer flooding and (ii) to increase the storm capacity of drainage systems; and if he will make a statement. [125624]
Ian Pearson: In January 2007, as part of DEFRA’s new strategy on flood management (known as “Making space for water”), I announced the start of 15 integrated urban drainage pilot studies around the country. Further details can be found at http://www.defra.gov.uk/environ/fcd/policy/strategy/ha2.htm The projects, made possible by £1.7 million of funding from DEFRA, will test new approaches to reduce the risk of urban drainage flooding, both from sewers and stormwater.
While the pilot projects will not directly fund capital improvements, they should bring greater clarity on responsibilities for funding urban drainage management between water companies, local authorities, the Environment Agency, Internal Drainage Boards and the Highways Agency. Following completion of the pilot projects in spring 2008, DEFRA will produce new guidance on effective partnership working to deliver integrated drainage solutions in high risk urban catchments and prepare a regulatory impact assessment for any proposed legislative changes.
For 2005-10, Ofwat has allowed water and sewerage companies a programme of nearly £1 billion to safeguard homes against the risk of sewer flooding. This would resolve or mitigate every known high risk problem of internal flooding from overloaded sewers where companies’ plans said action is needed by 2010.
Livestock: Transport
Derek Wyatt: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when Article 36 of the Treaty of Rome was last invoked for the export of live animals. [127624]
Mr. Bradshaw [holding answer 15 March 2007]: I assume that the question refers to Article 30 of the Treaty of Rome, which was Article 36 prior to the current Treaty.
I am aware of two rulings by the European Court of Justice in cases relating to the export of live animals in which Article 30 (then Article 36) was invoked. Case C-5/1994, ruled on 23 May 1996, relates to a UK ban on exporting sheep to Spain because of concerns over welfare conditions in Spanish abattoirs. Case C-1/1996, ruled on 15 July 1997, was a case brought by Compassion in World Farming on banning the export of calves destined for veal crates. In both cases, the European Court of Justice made clear that a European
Union member state may not ban or limit a trade if it is subject to harmonised rules that must be complied with equally by all member states.
Veterinary Medicine
Alan Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what veterinary uses are permitted for (a) kanamycin and (b) neomycin; and how much of each medicine was used in the UK in each of the last five years. [128107]
Mr. Bradshaw: There have been no veterinary pharmaceutical products authorised for sale on the UK market in the last five years that include kanamycin.
Neomycin is present as an active substance with antimicrobial activity in a number of veterinary medicinal products with several routes of administration including topical, oral and injectable. It is a broad spectrum antibiotic active against a number of gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.
The following table details how much neomycin was sold for veterinary use on an annual basis in the UK, for the last five years for which data are available.
| Tonnes of Neomycin active ingredient sold | Number of products included | |
Wastes: Nuisance
Martin Horwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what recent estimate he has made of the annual clean-up and repair costs imposed on (a) local authorities and (b) businesses in respect of (i) litter, (ii) dog fouling, (iii) graffiti, (iv) fly-posting, (v) noise and (vi) fly-tipping in each of the last 10 years; and if he will make a statement. [126899]
Mr. Bradshaw: Local authorities do not have a duty to clear fly-posting or graffiti. We do not therefore collect data on clear-up costs to local authorities or to businesses for these or for noise. Street cleansing costs (which include both litter and dog fouling) have been maintained for the last five years, and are shown in the following table(1).
(1) It should be noted that comparisons across years may not be valid due to changes in the method of reporting the information.
| Total England net current data for street cleansing (not chargeable to highways) | |
| Amount (£000) | |
| Source: Communities and Local Government Revenue Outturn (RO) returns. | |
Flycapture, the national database of fly-tipping incidents, was set up in 2004 by DEFRA, the
Environment Agency and the Local Government Association, to record fly-tipping incidents dealt with by the Environment Agency and local authorities. Data on fly-tipping levels and estimated clean-up costs are therefore only available from April 2004 onwards.
The cost of clearing illegally dumped waste reported by local authorities between April 2004 and March 2005 was over £44 million. For the period between April 2005 and March 2006, the cost was almost £50 million.
DEFRA does not hold data on the clear-up costs of fly-tipping to businesses. However, when the costs of clearance on private land are included, the 2005-06 clearance costs are estimated to rise to over £100 million.
Water Treatment: Reed Beds
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what discussions he has had with (a) Water UK, (b) water companies and (c) the Environment Agency on the use of reed-based technology. [127200]
Ian Pearson: DEFRA recognises that reed beds can usefully form part of Sustainable Drainage Systems (SUDS) and part of the process for treating foul sewage.
DEFRA is working closely with Communities and Local Government (CLG) in the development of surface water management planning as part of revised Planning Policy Statement (PPS) 25. The production of surface water management plans is being trialled by some of the partnerships within DEFRA’s Integrated Urban Drainage Pilot Projects. The 15 pilots across England, made possible by £1.7 million of funding from DEFRA, will test new approaches to reduce the risk of urban drainage flooding.
DEFRA is a key member of the National SUDS Working Group (NSWG), of which representatives of water companies, Water UK, the Local Government Association, the Environment Agency, developers and other organisations such as CABE are also members. DEFRA has a current work stream to examine options for resolving the combined issue of SUDS adoption, maintenance and funding and has recently consulted with the NSWG on this matter. We expect to carry out wider consultation in this regard later this year.
In respect of foul sewage treatment, the owner/operator of a sewage treatment plant is required to comply with the relevant discharge consent. The appropriate process and techniques for achieving compliance vary from location to location and are essentially decided by the owner/operator of the treatment works. Reed beds are acknowledged to be a suitable technology and are used in many situations, including at works managed by water companies (instead of, or in addition to other processes). As we look at making development more sustainable, by reducing carbon inputs, reed beds may be one of the techniques that facilitate this.
Whales: Conservation
Norman Baker:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what the Government’s policy is on fish imports from (a)
Norway and (b) Iceland; and what account was taken of those countries’ policies on whaling in formulating this policy. [127038]
Mr. Bradshaw: Fisheries agreements with third countries, including those on imports, are negotiated by the European Commission on behalf of all member sates. Neither the Council of Ministers nor the Commission exercises Community competence over whaling issues and there is no common EU line on whaling matters. Not all EU member states are even members of the International Whaling Commission. As such, negotiations with third countries on fisheries and trade matters are unaffected by those countries’ stance on whaling. While the European Commission joined the recent demarche against Iceland over its resumption of commercial whaling, it did so on its own behalf, rather than on behalf of member states.
Norman Baker: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will write to EU member states asking them to join the International Whaling Commission (IWC) in sufficient time to enable them to be eligible for voting rights at this year’s IWC meeting in May. [127039]
Mr. Bradshaw: My right, hon. Friends the Secretary of State and the Foreign Secretary have recently jointly written to a dozen EU and Accession States encouraging them to join the International Whaling Commission. A new publication, ‘Protecting Whales —A Global Responsibility’, endorsed by the Prime Minister and Sir David Attenborough has also been sent to these countries encouraging them to join the effort to protect all cetacean species. UK embassies and Ministers across Government will continue to lobby on this issue in the run-up to the next annual meeting of the IWC in Alaska in May. However, not all of those who are willing to join the IWC will be able to complete the necessary parliamentary processes in time to secure voting rights at the 2007 meeting.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
Afghanistan: Drugs
Mr. Keith Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what support is being given to revitalise the Afghan economy as part of the UK’s counter-narcotics strategy in Afghanistan. [127070]
Hilary Benn: I have been asked to reply.
The UK is spending £270 million over three years to support the Government of Afghanistan’s (GoA) National Drug Control Strategy. We have helped the GoA create a Counter Narcotics Trust Fund to mobilise international donor support and develop Afghan counter narcotics planning and capacity. DFID plays a key role by promoting alternative, legal livelihoods to help revitalise the Afghan economy. Legal livelihoods can be regulated and taxed by the government, and form the basis for long-term, sustainable economic growth. DFID’s Livelihoods Programme, worth nearly £150 million between 2006-09, is supporting GoA National Priority Programmes to develop legal livelihood opportunities as alternatives to poppy
farming. Examples include our £18 million support for the National Rural Access Programme (NRAP) and our £20 million contribution over three years to the Micro-finance Investment Support Facility of Afghanistan (MISFA). NRAP has built essential infrastructure such as roads, bridges and irrigation schemes, and has generated over 15 million days of labour for Afghans. MISFA has so far provided small loans to over 230,000 Afghan families. This has enabled poor people who would otherwise not have access to credit to successfully invest in income-generating activities.
DFID is also contributing £9 million to the GoA to help boost legal private sector activity by reducing red tape and improving the business environment, and supporting the mining sector and encouraging foreign investment. Of this, £1 million has been channelled through a World Bank-managed Trust Fund which provides risk guarantees to attract foreign investors. In the past year, this Trust Fund has supported three projects which are expected to trigger over $26 million of investment, stimulate the cotton and pharmaceutical sector, and expand access to credit. This will help to further enhance private sector opportunities and revitalise the legal Afghan economy.
Mr. Hague: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many alternative livelihoods projects have been established in Helmand Province; and if she will make a statement. [127167]
Hilary Benn: I have been asked to reply.
DFID has helped to establish a range of alternative livelihoods projects in Helmand. We are providing £30 million over three years to the Helmand Agriculture and Rural Development Programme (HARDP), from 2006 to 2009. This programme is increasing alternative livelihood opportunities for the rural poor of Helmand by supporting the Government of Afghanistan's implementation of its National Priority Programmes. These include the National Solidarity Programme, National Rural Access Programme, Micro-Finance Investment and Support Facility in Afghanistan, and Water and Sanitation Programme. They are providing longer-term improvements in water and sanitation, essential small-scale rural infrastructure, and access to small loans, as well as improved roads, access to markets, agricultural inputs and training.
DFID is also funding the £3 million Research into Alternative Livelihoods Fund (RALF). This supports work on alternative livelihoods in Helmand, for example through the Restorative Agriculture and Rural Economy Research Project, which explores the export feasibility of numerous crops including grapes, tomatoes, mushrooms, eggplants and okra. The project is evaluating different small-scale agri-processing industries, and producing case studies of value-added alternative livelihood options, for example tomato paste.
We are funding 114 Quick Impact Projects (QIPs) in Helmand. These are not all alternative livelihoods projects, but they do support a range of income-generating activities for poor people. These include furniture-making, construction, carpet-weaving and the provision of tractors for farming.
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