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8 Apr 2010 : Column 1501W—continued
Flood Control
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many (a) homes and (b) businesses are registered to receive warning messages from the Environment Agency's Floodline Warnings Direct; and how many properties have received such warnings since the Floodline was established. [325838]
Huw Irranca-Davies: There are 950,000 properties registered to receive warnings from the Environment Agency's Floodline Warnings Direct (FWD) service. Around 840,000 of these are homes and about 110,000 are businesses.
As of 31 March 2010, almost 150,000 properties have received warnings since FWD was established on 25 January 2006.
Horses: Passports
Mr. Gray: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (1) how many horses have been issued with passports; [324877]
(2) how many horses have (a) thoroughbred, (b) individual pony and (c) Horse Society passports; [324878]
(3) how many horses are recorded on the National Equine Database. [324879]
Jim Fitzpatrick: The National Equine Database shows that as of 25 March 2010, 1,204,833 passports have been issued by UK Passport Issuing Organisations (PIOs). Of these, 342, 242 were Weatherby's Thoroughbred passports. It is not possible to provide the number of "individual pony" and "horse society" passports as a number of organisations issue passports for both horses and ponies.
As of 25 March 2010 the National Equine Database contains 1,606,680 horse records. These include data taken from passports, old breeding papers issued before the introduction of passports and horse performance records which cannot yet be matched to a passport. Therefore some horses will be dead or duplicated within the system.
Nature Conservation: Expenditure
David T. C. Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much his Department spent on protecting (a) bats and (b) other protected species in the most recent year for which figures are available. [325829]
Huw Irranca-Davies: More than 300 species are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 and the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2010, including all species of bats. These will benefit from a diverse range of funding streams and conservation effort involving the DEFRA network of organisations and with the exception of any species-specific projects, figures are not accounted for in this way. I refer to my previous answer of 22 Mar 2010, Official Report, column 138W, on overall biodiversity expenditure, which would include conservation of protected species.
With specific regard to bats, the UK is a party to the Agreement on the Conservation of European Bats (the Eurobats Agreement) which promotes their protection internationally and for which the UK subscription in 2010 was £59,890.68. In addition the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) contributed £87,000 to the National Bat Monitoring Programme in 2009-10. Natural England estimates that it has spent approximately £370,000 on work intended to protect bats in 2009-10.
Oils: Waste Disposal
Mr. David Anderson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what volume of waste oils has been exported to (a) Germany, (b) Italy and (c) other EU member states (i) in total and (ii) for re-refining in the last three years. [325730]
Dan Norris: The following tables show the data requested.
| Total exported | |||
| Tonnes | |||
| Italy | Germany | Other EU member states | |
| Total exported for re-refining | |||
| Tonnes | |||
| Italy | Germany | Other EU member states | |
These data were obtained from the Environment Agency's National Transfrontier Shipments (NaTS) Database on 1 April 2010. NaTS records the details of all shipments of waste notified under the Waste Shipment Regulation (EC1013/2006/EC).
The data for 2009-10 are currently an incomplete data set so these will be subject to change as data are received.
Mr. David Anderson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what recent discussions his Department has had with representatives of the waste oil regeneration industry on promotion of investment in regeneration of waste oils. [325770]
Dan Norris: DEFRA continues to maintain regular contact with the waste oil industry on a variety of issues affecting the management of waste oil.
Representatives of the waste oil processing industry are members of the Stakeholder Group relating to the transposition of the revised Waste Framework Directive (2008/98/EC), including the provisions in article 4 on the waste hierarchy and article 21 on waste oils. They were also involved in the Hazardous Waste Steering Group, which helped advise on the recently published Strategy for Hazardous Waste Management in England.
Informal discussions with the sector indicate that proposed investors in regeneration continue to watch the market situation in the UK and greater re-refining remains a possibility.
Mr. David Anderson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs whether his Department has undertaken a life cycle assessment of the environmental impact arising from the export of waste oils for re-refining. [325771]
Dan Norris: DEFRA has not commissioned specific studies on the life cycle assessment of the environmental impact arising from the export of waste oils for re-refining. However, we are aware of the following life cycle studies:
GEIR (Groupement Europeen de l'Industrie de la Regeneration, part of the Independent Union of the European Lubricants industry) report: Ecological and energetic assessment of re-refining used oils to base oils: Substitution of primarily produced base oils including semi-synthetic and synthetic compounds:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Working Group on Waste Prevention and Recycling report: Improving Recycling Markets:
The European Commission report: Critical Review Of Existing Studies And Life Cycle Analysis On The Regeneration And Incineration Of Waste Oils:
Poultry: Animal Welfare
Mr. Hancock: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what steps his Department plans to take to reduce the incidence of keel bone fractures in laying hens; and if he will make a statement. [325831]
Jim Fitzpatrick: The Government recognise that this is a key welfare concern in laying hens, which is why DEFRA's animal welfare research programme is currently funding a three-year project by the university of Bristol on the impact of keel bone fractures on the welfare of laying hens. The aim of this study is to understand and identify risk factors associated with keel bone fractures in order to consider how to adapt production systems to improve the welfare of laying hens.
Waste Management: Business
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment he has made of the effects of (a) private finance initiative contracts relating to and (b) Government funding of residual waste plants on the ability of small businesses and community groups to set up residual waste projects. [325115]
Dan Norris: DEFRA constantly assesses the financial markets to ensure that waste private finance initiative (PFI) projects are financially viable. This includes meetings with banks, contractors and waste companies as well as individual waste local authorities. In November 2009, Officials from DEFRA's Waste Infrastructure Delivery Programme (WIDP) hosted a meeting attended by representatives from some 20 banking institutions.
PFI credits are given to local waste authorities and not to individual businesses and community groups. The local waste authority will then tender for companies within the PFI's criteria.
Defence
Afghanistan: Peacekeeping Operations
Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many improvised explosive devices have (a) been defused and (b) exploded in Afghanistan in each month since 2007. [322516]
Mr. Kevan Jones: Records of incidents for the whole of Afghanistan are not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
However, data are available for activity up to February 2010 concerning Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) in the area of Helmand Province for which Task Force Helmand has responsibility. This area of responsibility has not stayed constant during the period in question.
| Number of IED explosions recorded by Task Force Helmand | ||||
| 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | |
The figures above refer to an explosion that has subsequently been reported by units operating within the Task Force Helmand area of responsibility. The figures include both 'laid' IEDs and suicide (both vehicle and person-borne) devices.
| Number of IEDs neutralised recorded by Task Force Helmand | ||||
| 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | |
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