Daniel Zeichner

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Dame Siobhain. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough), not just for securing this important debate—and for winning South Norfolk, which is very precious to me—but for his continued commitment to championing our agriculture sector. East Anglia is a crucial part of the UK’s livestock and, in particular, arable sectors and provides quality produce that underpins our nation’s food security and is in demand across Europe and beyond. We have had a thoughtful and sensible discussion this morning. Let me start by reiterating the Government’s total commitment to all those who work in the agriculture and horticulture sectors, and all those beyond. They are on the frontline, not only producing our food but protecting our national biosecurity. I was struck by the passionate interventions by all speakers this morning. I listened closely to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) talking about the impact that bovine TB has on people. I was struck by the account that my hon. Friend the Member for South West Norfolk (Terry Jermy) gave of walking through Thetford and seeing the dead birds after the avian influenza outbreak. Of course, I could not help but be struck by the way my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Mr Charters) summed up biosecurity as being like a Yorkshire wall—solid, well-built and designed to keep out things we do not want here. I paraphrase, but he gave a very good account of what we are trying to achieve. I also listened closely to the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Dr Hudson). I do not think anyone could have failed to be moved by his powerful personal account of the foot and mouth outbreak, and I echo his warm words for those in our Government Departments, such as the chief vet, Christine Middlemiss, for the work they do. I think there is actually a lot of agreement in the Chamber this morning about the importance of the issue and our support for those working on it. Biosecurity is vital. It underpins safe food, protects animal and plant health, and supports a prosperous economy and trade. It is a joint endeavour: Government, animal keepers, horticulturists and the public must do everything we can collectively to keep disease out. As we have heard from Members this morning, the costs are significant. Plant diseases alone are estimated to cost the global economy over $220 billion annually, and up to 40% of global crop production is lost to pests each year. Those are huge numbers, and are sadly unlikely to reduce as climate change drives the geographic expansion and the host range of pests and diseases. Healthy plants and animals are not just an important tool in the fight against climate change and biodiversity loss, but contribute directly to many of the UN’s sustainable development goals—in particular, ending hunger, achieving food security, improving nutrition, and promoting sustainable agriculture. Pests and diseases know no borders. New and emerging threats are often the result of trade and globalisation, and are then further exacerbated by climate change. Safe trade is essential to food security in a thriving economy. We want healthy trade to support food security and the economy, but at the same time we need to protect ourselves from risks. That is why DEFRA is a key delivery Department of the UK biological security strategy, which takes a UK-wide approach that strengthens deterrence and resilience, projects global leadership and exploits opportunities for UK prosperity. In parallel, the environmental improvement plan sets out how we will improve our environment at home and abroad, including through enhancing biosecurity. I can assure the House that we have in place robust measures to maintain and improve our ability to understand, detect, prevent, respond and recover from outbreaks that affect animals and that affect plants. One of our first defences is to understand the threats and monitor the risks, which we do through established expert groups, the veterinary risk group, the human animal infections and risk surveillance group, and the plant health risk group. Our programmes of research support the expert groups. For example, for plant health, DEFRA has invested more than £8 million into ash dieback research, including the world’s largest screening trials for resistant trees, the Living Ash Project, while for animal health, DEFRA and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council are funding £6.5 million of research projects to better forecast, understand, mitigate and avoid vector-borne diseases transmitted by mosquitoes and ticks. Our second line of defence is detection through strong surveillance systems. Our network of official laboratories, veterinary investigators, border inspectors and bee, fish, and plant inspectors all contribute to the early warning detections for signs of disease or antimicrobial resistance. Thirdly, prevention is key. As the saying goes, prevention is better than cure, so this Government will take action to prevent pests and diseases from arriving in the first place. Preventing an outbreak of African swine fever in the UK, for example, remains one of our key biosecurity priorities. Although, as has rightly been said, we have not had an outbreak of ASF in the UK, the overall risk of an incursion is currently assessed to be medium. We continue to prepare for a possible outbreak. To help prevent ASF incursions in the UK, robust safeguards are in place, prohibiting live pigs, wild boar, or pork products from affected European Union areas from entering Great Britain. Enforcement is carried out by Border Force and Port Health Authority officers at seaports and airports. Under the enhanced safeguard measures introduced in the autumn—I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer for referencing them—travellers are no longer allowed to bring pork products into Great Britain unless they are produced and packaged to the EU’s commercial standards and weigh no more than 2 kg. DEFRA and its agencies continuously review the spread of ASF and other diseases, and are ready to introduce further biosecurity restrictions, should they be deemed necessary, in response to new scientific and risk data. Our fourth line of defence is our response capability. Our disease contingency plans and underpinning legislation are regularly reviewed to ensure that they remain fit for purpose, and that we have the necessary capacity and capability to respond. We exercise our plans regularly and work closely with stakeholders on their own preparedness.