1 Scrutinising Defra
The work of
the Committee
1. The Committee's core task is to scrutinise the
administration, expenditure and policies of the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the bodies for
which its Ministers are responsible. In doing so throughout this
Parliament, we have sought to combine our approach, both focusing
on individual policy proposals as they arise and providing more
thematic investigations into major areas within the Department's
remit. Over the past five years, we have conducted some 60 inquiries
across the gamut of policy areas for which the Department has
responsibility. We have taken oral evidence from some 345 organisations
and individuals, and received over 1,000 pieces of written evidence.
2. In addition, we have examined draft legislation:
one of the core tasks identified by the Liaison Committee for
departmental select committees to undertake. We looked at proposed
Bills on: reform of the water industry; managing dangerous dogs;
prohibiting wild animals in circuses; and the establishment of
a Groceries Code Adjudicator. We held pre-appointment hearings
and endorsed the appointments of Chairs of four key Defra agencies:
the Environment Agency (EA), Natural England (NE), the Water Services
Regulation Authority (Ofwat) and the Gangmasters Licensing Authority
(GLA). Our scrutiny of policy has frequently involved a review
of progress on the implementation of legislation and its impacts,
such as on floods and water management, although we have not conducted
post-legislative scrutiny into a specific Act—another core
task for departmental select committees. With much of the legislation
relating to Defra's remit originating from EU requirements, we
have repeatedly focused on key EU policies relating to agriculture,
fisheries and the environment, looking at how Defra is both influencing
development of policy and implementing the outcomes in the UK.
3. The aim of this report is to provide our successor
Committee with a short review of our work over this Parliament.
Given its range and depth, we cannot reflect all of our work in
detail nor provide an exhaustive list of all the issues which
we consider important. We hope, however, that future members of
a scrutiny committee will find this report a helpful guide to
some of the areas where we consider Defra policies and practices
have the most impact on the UK's environment, food systems and
rural communities. We also identify significant issues which merit
continuing scrutiny beyond dissolution of this Parliament.
4. We are grateful to the large number of individuals
and organisations who have given us evidence in writing or in
person and to the special advisers and staff who have supported
us in our task.
The work of the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
5. Defra is among the Government's smaller Departments.[1]
More than 80% of its expenditure is delivered through executive
agencies and arms-length bodies, among the biggest of which are
the Rural Payments Agency (RPA), the EA, and NE. A common theme
across a large part of our work has been the negative impact on
policy formulation and delivery resulting from the hollowing out
of Defra's core functions: there needs to be a more robust central
body of expertise driving forward the Department's aims and balancing
the strength of the arms-length bodies, with firm Ministerial
leadership including to deliver environmental objectives across
government. The engagement of staff employed at Defra, measured
via annual staff surveys, is consistently lower than the civil
service average, with staff repeatedly reporting absence of clarity
about their managers' vision and their own prospects for advancement.
In combination, this arms-length distance from policy delivery
and comparatively poor staff morale raises questions about the
Department's effectiveness, which are amplified by the consistent
failure of the Department to meet goals it sets itself. Two examples
of that are: the waste of around £600 million over the years
in EU fines because of the RPA's failure properly to implement
the 2005 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) settlement, and repeated
'moving of goalposts' over the numbers of badgers to be culled
in trials designed to reduce bovine TB. Balancing budgetary pressures
against Defra's future budget and its capacity to manage delivery
of its policy objectives by bodies at a distance will continue
to be a major challenge for the Department. We would anticipate
this being a key focus of future scrutiny by our successor Committee.
1 For the most recent report into Defra's performance
see Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Eighth Report
of Session 2014-15, Defra performance in 2013-14, HC 802 Back
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