My Lords, it is very appropriate that this debate should follow one on defence and security because it has exactly the same theme, except that the bugs are not cyber bugs but actual ones, since those still exist. It is also appropriate because I understand that this week is Invasive Species Week; the first such week took place in 2015. I know that the Minister, who is very involved in this sector, has also been involved in a number of other initiatives. The other reason this debate comes at exactly the right time is the publication of the report by the intergovernmental committee on biodiversity and ecosystems, which laid out how the numbers of species within the ecology across the globe were threatened. One thing it highlighted, which was perhaps not publicised quite so strongly in the press, was that alien and invasive species are a severe threat to biodiversity across the globe—including Europe, obviously, and our own country. That is why this subject is so important.
Also, to reflect some of the comments in the previous debate, if Brexit happens, although we will be leaving the European Union, we will not be leaving the European biosphere. We share its marine and aerial environments, and we are only 22 miles away from its terrestrial environment. The question to which my committee particularly wanted to find an answer was whether, post Brexit, our ecology will be as protected on invasive species and biosecurity as it was during our membership of the European Union. Can we even improve on the situation that we have at the moment?
The threat is very real. I am sure that all of us will remember the foot and mouth outbreak back in the early 2000s. That cost the country some £8 billion, but in some ways that was nothing compared to the effect it had on farming communities and rural communities throughout the kingdom. We know that we now have ash dieback disease; a recent report from Oxford University suggests that the total cost of that disease will be some £15 billion over 100 years, half of that—£7.5 billion—coming over the next 10 years. These threats are real and they are about real organisms. There is the Asian hornet and the American skunk cabbage, which I am sure the Minister will talk to us more about later, although I had never heard of it before. It is also about oak disease and a number of other threats to our ecology at this moment.
We are not only a part of the European biosphere but absolutely integrated into the systems of the European Union in this area of national security and defence. Let me remind Members of four of those systems: the animal disease notification system; the alien species notification system; the rapid alert system for food and feed; and, lastly, the plant health interception system. While I very much welcome the Government’s response—they wanted to remain a part of those systems—one of my first questions to the Minister is: has that bid progressed in any way? Are we at all confident that we will be able to participate in those systems, and if there is no deal in place do we have alternative systems? Most importantly, I am aware that, through those systems and that shared intelligence among the communities of scientists and researchers in those areas, we have advance warning of these organisms approaching us across the continent. We are able to prepare and plan for those potential invasions. How will we be able to continue having those connections and those sorts of systems once we are outside the European Union?
My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register. Sadly, I was not a member of the committee, but I thank its members for all their hard work. The report has been well received and was very well introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, who has great experience in this area.
Biodiversity is not just a national or a European problem—it is a worldwide matter of huge concern. I congratulate the Government on their commitment to maintaining internationally recognised environmental principles, whether or not we leave the EU. Can my noble friend Lord Gardiner tell us what progress has been made on the 2020 global framework updating the UN Convention on Biological Diversity? If we get it right at a global level, we have a better chance of getting it right at a national level.
In our discussions on leaving the EU, we tend to think of EU standards as very good—but they are not always. Dutch elm disease reached us before we joined the EEC, but since then our trees have been infected with phytophthora ramorum; red band needle blight has resurfaced; and we have ash dieback, sweet chestnut blight and horse chestnut leaf miner. We are encouraged to plant more trees, and this was reinforced by the climate change committee’s recent report. What trees does my noble friend recommend that we should plant that our grandchildren might be able to enjoy? What action has there been on Action Oak, which was launched by my noble friend Lord De Mauley when he was a Minister?
There are plenty of diseases in Europe which might come our way and cause us a lot of trouble. We need to be constantly vigilant. Can my noble friend update us on the spread of xylella fastidiosa? What extra measures are we taking to prevent it coming here? Does he agree with me that planting mixed species and preferably managing woodlands on an uneven-aged basis with no clear felling is better for our biosecurity and biodiversity than the current system of planting trees in straight lines and single crop? I have been arguing that for 50 years, and perhaps my time is coming.
Before my noble friend sits down, has he had the opportunity to see the briefing produced by the Woodland Trust identifying what it thinks is the way forward on what it calls an effective biosecurity strategy? I wonder whether the Minister has seen it. I seriously recommend it to anybody who is concerned about this subject—it sets out exactly what we should do to protect our trees.
My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Earl. I think that the Minister will be pleased that I have only two questions to add to the impressive list that has already been put before him.
As I intend to restrict my remarks to two issues and mainly to the part of the report that deals with UK-EU biosecurity collaboration, I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests, particularly the reference to my relationship with St Catharine’s College, Cambridge. That relates to the setting-up of BioRISC, a research initiative to provide cutting-edge, evidence-based information about existing and emerging biological security threats and interventions—I can sense those who know me wondering why I am involved in that given my background, but it is proving a significant education to me.
I add to the congratulations and appreciation expressed to the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and his committee on this wide-ranging and very good report. As the noble Lord reminded us, biosecurity is an important issue. The Government agree with that. So serious a matter is it that, in July last year, they published a UK Biological Security Strategy. Governments do not publish national strategies unless the nature of the threat merits it. We can infer from the publication of this document that the National Security Council, the main forum for discussion of national security, found agreement that biological security is a priority for our collective security.
The very existence of the strategy leads me to the preamble to my first point. It is astonishing that, in late 2018, when I last looked, a search of Hansard revealed no reference to it—no ministerial Statement, not even when it was launched; no debate; no Written or Oral Question; apparently no committee interest; and no parliamentary accountability or scrutiny whatever. Not only Ministers but Members of both Houses have been largely silent on the strategy. A conversation at least, and in this House, is long overdue. I ask the Minister whether, in government time, we can have a debate on the national biological security strategy.
My Lords, I declare my interests as recorded in the register and thank the chairman of our committee, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, for his excellent leadership as well as his superb introduction to the content of the report.
I am not a betting man, but if I were, I would be happy to place a bet that, within the next 10 years, we will have a major biosecurity crisis in this country. Why? We have just to look back in history. We heard in earlier speeches about foot and mouth disease—which came in 1967 and again in 2001—Dutch elm disease and ash dieback. I will add to that list BSE. So the record of the past is that at least once every 10 years we have a major biosecurity crisis, but for at least the last 40 years, as the noble Lord, Lord Browne, so clearly articulated, we have been under the shelter of a Europe-wide system of protection. As we move out of that protection system, the chances of a biosecurity crisis, as others have said, will increase rather than decrease. In that context, I want to focus specifically on food safety and biosecurity.
Noble Lords will recall that in the wake of the biggest food safety and biosecurity challenge of the past 100 years, namely the BSE crisis of the 1990s and early 2000s, the Government of the day established a new, non-ministerial department, the Food Standards Agency in 2000—I should declare that I was its first chairman—to protect the interests of consumers in relation to food safety and biosecurity. Following our model, in 2003 the European Union established a Europe-wide agency, EFSA, the European Food Safety Authority, based on the UK model. Indeed, it pinched the chief executive of our Food Standards Agency to become its first chief executive. As a consequence of the arrangements set up in 2003, we are now part of the Europe-wide system for risk assessment, biosecurity and other food safety alerts, and risk management, as the noble Lords, Lord Teverson and Lord Browne of Ladyton, emphasised. As a result of Brexit, if Brexit happens, we will leave this well-established and effective system and replicate it, as best we can, on our own.
8:26 pm
Lord Selkirk of Douglas (Con)
My Lords, it is a great privilege to follow the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, who put his finger on a spot of enormous importance, which is that the Food Standards Agency has been a success story and this should be borne in mind by the Government.
I should mention a past interest: I represented the constituency of Edinburgh West for more than 20 years, during which time I witnessed the way that an alien and enormously destructive bark beetle was able to ravage the arboreal ecological systems in our country. Scotland’s capital city has lost more than 30,000 elm trees since the late 1960s, when the new, virulent strain of Dutch elm disease was brought to the United Kingdom—on, it is believed, logs from North America. By 1980, 20 million trees throughout the United Kingdom had been destroyed, which gives some picture of the enormity of the task facing the Government and our country.
As for the biosecurity of our animal life, the current threat to our pigs from the spread of African swine fever is very dangerous and every effort is being made to keep it at bay and provide a protective vaccine. The shocking fate of our elm trees and the alarming threat posed by the global advance of the virulent and deadly African swine fever offer a stark reminder and a warning about the importance of having truly effective and fit-for-purpose biosecurity systems in place to protect the United Kingdom from imported threats to the health of our plants, trees and animals.
The sub-committee’s report expresses considerable concern over whether the United Kingdom will be able to replace, and in many cases recreate in time for our exit, all the safeguards, alerts and intelligence-sharing put in place over the years by the European Union and which currently help to protect our plants and animals from dangerous invaders. It urges that we should seek continued participation in EU alerts on animal, plant and pest disease threats. I congratulate the chairman of our committee, the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, on his wise and far-sighted advice to the Government. On publication of the report, he said:
“The existing arrangements are far from perfect, but significant gaps will be created when the UK leaves them. We rely on the EU for everything from auditing plant nurseries and farms to funding our research laboratories. The UK Government has a huge amount of work to do to replace this system in time for Brexit, and failure to do so could have an economic and environmental impact that would be felt for decades to come”.
I raise with the Minister the vital matter of who will be in place to implement all the new biosecurity checks and inspection procedures that will soon have to be rolled out and put into operation on a UK-only basis. The Chief Veterinary Officer of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Dr Christine Middlemiss, told the committee that,
My Lords, I draw attention to my interests as recorded in the register.
In rereading this excellent report, it is clear that what is at issue is the scale of damage to our nation if there were to be a serious lapse in biosecurity. My noble friend Lord Teverson and other noble Lords have already mentioned foot and mouth. Who can forget the terrible scenes as farmers and emergency services battled to rid the country of it, or the nostalgia with which we still regret the absence of the majestic elm from our countryside?
The briefing from the Woodland Trust tells us that, during the UK’s membership of the EU, global biosecurity threats—particularly in plant biosecurity—have increased significantly and that the UK’s response has sadly been less than exemplary. The report is therefore timely and very well put together, and I take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to the clerks of the Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee for their skill in helping members of the committee, of which I am one, to access the material to produce such an informative report. I also extend my appreciation to my noble friend Lord Teverson for his excellent chairmanship and masterful introduction to this debate. I will concentrate on two aspects: food safety risk management, which has already been covered by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs—although perhaps I can offer something a little different—and compliance and monitoring.
First, what happens to food safety risk management if we do not have a seamless transition from being an integral partner in the EU’s disease notification systems to not having a seat at the table? Just to recap, the four main notification systems are: the animal disease notification system; RASFF, the rapid alert system for food and feed; the European alien species notification system; and the European Union notification system for plant health interceptions. The importance of these early alert agencies has been recognised by the Government, who have stated their intention to retain access to these systems. It is good that the Government recognise that it is important to be part of the discussion that leads to decisions about what information will be put in the public domain and what will not. As the chemists among us will know, after filtration, both the filtrate and the substrate are of interest. However, as things currently stand, the fact is that the only third countries that take part in any of these organisations are those in the animal disease notification system, and they are either candidate or potential candidate countries, or members of EFTA. For the other three bodies, full participation is restricted to member states only.
It sounds very much like we would be willing to shut the stable door once the horse has bolted. I hope that the Minister is now of a more proactive frame of mind. It is much more cost effective to address and manage the risks before catastrophe strikes and farm animals, lives and livelihoods are lost. I hope, if nothing else, that the Government will now take heed of that message from this report.
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On day-to-day issues, the IT system called TRACES is absolutely fundamental in tracking the progress of trade between European Union member states of animal and plant products. We have had assurances from the Government that we now have an alternative to that system. Has it been truly tested yet? Will it be able to integrate with the TRACES system, allowing us at least to approach on the phytosanitary side the frictionless trade that will be so important between us and Europe on food and animal products in future? Those are clearly key issues.
Other issues that came out of the report are, first, around trade. I have mentioned EU-UK trade, which is very important for the farming industry in this country, but will we be able to have the systems that we will need to cope in the future? It particularly concerns me that the Government are clear in making the point that from day one, when we leave the Union or end the transition period, we will have exactly the same list of potential threats to biosecurity. We will have the same lists as parts of those systems but, clearly, they are likely to diverge quite significantly over the first one to three years. How will we deal with frictionless trade at the point when we have that divergence on scientific advice? Will we instead ensure alignment well into the future?
The greatest concern is about new trade deals. We often talk about America and the great leverage it would have on a trade deal with us. On the details of that trade deal, we are far from confident that environmental and biosecurity issues will be at the top of that list. Will they be a sine qua non, without which we will not do that deal? Can the Minister assure us that that is still the case? We know that even with China, there are huge issues with food quality. A lot of the problems with invasive issues in foodstuffs have been to do with Chinese products, as is a lot of the protection. Again, there is huge leverage there so, as a nation, will we be so concerned about having those trade deals post Brexit that we will not pay sufficient attention to those areas?
I come on to resources. We know that Defra has in the past been under huge constraints and reductions in funding. We know that large resources have been taken in there for Brexit planning. Will they remain there to ensure our biosecurity well into the future, rather than just on Brexit day one?
I come back to a theme that my committee has often talked about and taken evidence on: the veterinary profession. On the front line of industrial veterinary work, something like 95% of staff are EU citizens. The committee went to the London Gateway port two weeks ago, where we met the veterinary team on the front line. Of that team of eight, the lead and six others were Spanish, and one was Italian. There is a real issue about keeping those people here. Most of them will earn less than £30,000 and, under the present government proposals, they will not be able to enter the system.
Our research laboratories are the pride of the country; we are the European Union experts on foot and mouth disease, bluetongue disease and many others. We have access to the rest of that network of research laboratories, with all their scientific evidence and expertise. In addition, there is a collegiate feeling among the scientists and researchers in that community. How will we replace the research laboratories that concentrate elsewhere in the EU on other diseases and threats that do not exist here?
On the island of Ireland, the issue is different from the normal one about customs and borders, as bugs know no borders. Can we keep the island of Ireland as a single biological territory in terms of rules, regulations and biodefence? Will that be possible?
I have laid down a long list of challenges. However, we recognise that Brexit will give the United Kingdom the ability to make its own rules and regulations about biosecurity. Witnesses have looked at the very strong rules that New Zealand and Australia have to protect their bio-environment. Does the Minister see what areas of greater protection we might have, taking into consideration that those southern ocean territories are much more isolated from other territories than we are from Europe?
This is sometimes seen as rather a niche subject, yet it is a key part of the defence and security of our nation. There is already a threat and it is costing us £1.7 billion annually to make this defence effective. We are looking to the Government to assure us that once we leave Europe—if we leave Europe—we will have the same defence that we have now.
Disease and pests have affected not just trees. We imported the Obama flatworm from Holland, and the free movement of plants under the single market, which came into force in 1993, has been a mixed blessing. Invasive species are costing our economy at least £1.7 billion annually.
I should like to pick up quickly on two points made by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. He asked about advance notice—I suggest to him and to my noble friend that one area that could be used for advance notices is our embassies. They should be reporting regularly to us on the spread of diseases, so that in London we are fully up to date.
The committee was absolutely right to stress, as it did in the last sentence of the report’s summary:
“The need to facilitate trade post-Brexit must not be allowed to compromise the UK’s biodiversity”.
That is a point that the British Veterinary Association raised with me this morning when I telephoned. It is a major area of concern and a potential weak spot. What is being done to ensure that all departments in London and the devolved Administrations are joined up in their thinking and action on this?
Turning to animals, will my noble friend give us an update on where we are in creating a system to track stock imported and exported? Will the EU allow us to link into the trade control and export system if and when we leave? On the trade in animals, the Government need to pay as much attention to biocontainment—keeping problems at home—as to biosecurity, keeping problems at bay. We know how quick the French are to stop trading in animal products if there is a problem in the UK, and they will be even quicker when we leave the EU. Can my noble friend advise us on what actions the Government are taking with regard to biocontainment?
Leaving the EU is a unique opportunity for the Government to review our entire biosecurity structure. It is up to them to do this and to raise standards well above those of the EU as and when necessary. I believe that that is what is needed.
As on all other issues of national security, the Government rightly say that this strategy cannot be delivered by government on its own. Clearly, there is a role for many parts of society, for industry and for academia. Unfortunately, from my reading of the strategy, it contains lots of statements about what people are doing beyond the Government in relation to biological research, but there is no plan as to how this partnership and its activities will be taken forward. Perhaps in a more detailed debate we could tease out from the Government how they will administer and bring into action their strategic approach to biosecurity. At St Catharine’s, we intend to take advantage of the first anniversary of the strategy and have a conference of experts in order to identify 100 questions that need to be answered to implement it. Thereafter, we intend that these questions will form a coherent programme of academic research and study, perhaps for years to come, to deliver the strategy.
I have no criticism of this important report’s recommendations. On the contrary, I welcome its publication; it does this House and the country a great service. The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, said the following on its publication—I feel rather awkward having to read his words, when he read virtually none in his wide-ranging speech—which sums up effectively the point that I want to make:
“The existing”—
that is, European Union—
“arrangements are far from perfect but significant gaps will be created when the UK leaves them. We rely on the EU for everything from auditing plant nurseries and farms to funding our research laboratories. The UK Government has a huge amount of work to do to replace this system in time for Brexit, and failure to do so could have an economic and environmental impact that would be felt for decades to come."
Those words describe the scale of the challenge that we face at Brexit probably better than I could myself.
I regret that I cannot be so positive about the Government’s response. In it, they rely on various forms of the “we will work to build on existing capabilities”-type statements. For example, the responses to recommendations 10 and 13 are redolent of this approach. This language betrays a lack of recognition that we will be building not on the existing state of capabilities following Brexit but on a reduced set of capabilities, since the EU-based components will be necessarily diminished in various ways and substantial work will be needed to bring those diminished capabilities back up to existing levels to sustain them, never mind to build on them. If anybody has any doubt as to why that is the case, I recommend to them—I shall not read it—Michel Barnier’s speech to the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights in June 2018. In it, he spelled out the legal obligations that we among others imposed on the European Union that mean that we will have a necessarily diminished relationship with the European Union. It is impossible for us to sustain anything like the relationship that we currently have with those countries and their institutions.
My second point relates to the topical issue of the threat of invasive species. On cue, we read today of the Costa Rican frog that turned up, apparently healthy, in a shipment of bananas in a Lidl supermarket in Nottinghamshire. It has been all over the papers. The frog has even been given a name by those who discovered it.
Understanding the donor regions, vectors and introduction pathways of invasive species, plant pests and animal diseases is central to the effective prioritisation and management of future biological threats to the UK. Trade patterns have been demonstrated to be central to explaining the introduction of high-profile biological threats into this country, including foot and mouth, ash dieback and many invasive animals and plants.
Post-Brexit, the Government’s policy is that our trading patterns will change considerably. This is likely to have a profound effect on the origin and type of organisms that are introduced into the UK. This is an important point: before we joined the EEC in 1973, the vast majority of invasive species discovered in the UK had first established populations in mainland Europe. In the 40-odd years that we have been in the EU, that has reversed. It comes to us now predominantly from Europe, but that means that we get prior notice and sometimes guidance from them on the most effective management tools.
Changed trade patterns under Brexit are likely to result in the UK changing from being a recipient to being a donor of emerging biological threats to Europe. If the Government build the trading patterns that they anticipate, with countries such as China, the US and the 53 diverse members of the Commonwealth, we will have an enormous responsibility to develop tools for horizon-scanning, early detection, containment and possible eradication, as we will be the recipient and the introducer of many such threats. My question to the Minister is relatively simple: what planning do we have for that significant change, given our new trade policy?
I am confident, because we took evidence from its chairman, that the Food Standards Agency will do its utmost to ensure that food safety and biosecurity standards are maintained. Nevertheless, the UK will lose out. We will no longer, as others have said, have immediate access to the rapid alert system and the real-time, helicopter view of biosecurity that this system provides. We were told that the Food Standards Agency has made thorough preparations for the post-Brexit world and has been provided with extra resources to do so, which is very much to be welcomed. However, one crucial aspect of the new FSA role remains to be clarified and I hope the Minister will be able to provide a clear and unambiguous answer today. When the Food Standards Agency was set up, its role was to both assess and manage risks. This was crucial because the whole point of an independent department was to ensure that political considerations and conflicts between consumer and producer interests, which were perceived as important in MAFF’s attitude to food safety management and biosecurity, did not influence decisions. The Food Standards Agency, in its 19 years of existence, has been successful in rebuilding the shattered trust in the UK food system and associated biosecurity, which had reached a low point as a result of BSE and salmonella in eggs, for example.
Since the EU-wide system was established, risk-management decisions have been made at the European level by a committee on which the UK is represented by the Food Standards Agency. What will happen after Brexit? Initially, it appeared that Health Ministers wished to seize back control of risk-management decisions, leaving the FSA in a purely risk-assessment role. I quote from a letter written to the committee by the then Minister for Public Health, Steve Brine, who wrote on 3 December last year:
“Ministers will then take the final decisions”.
At that time it appeared that Ministers either had no knowledge of the history of why the Food Standards Agency was set up or were suffering from severe amnesia. However, subsequently the same Public Health Minister seemed to confirm that he had changed his mind. When he gave oral evidence to our sub-committee on 6 March and was asked whether it would be his intention to hand risk management back to the Food Standards Agency, he replied:
“It most certainly would, yes”.
So I seek confirmation from the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, this evening whether it is indeed the position of the Government that, after Brexit, the Food Standards Agency will have responsibility not just for risk assessment but also for risk management in relation to biosecurity as it affects our food. Furthermore, if the Government’s position has changed, as indicated by Steve Brine on 6 March, will the Minister inform us when the formal powers to undertake this role will be given to the Food Standards Agency?
Finally, very briefly, while I am talking about biosecurity, I should like to mention another aspect of the agency’s work, namely labelling of food. This is important for consumer choice and protection. As the Minister will be aware, in 2010 the Government decided to strip the Food Standards Agency of its responsibility for nutritional and food labelling. The logic of this decision was never properly explained: it was generally assumed that it was the result of pressure from the food industry, objecting to the agency’s effective role as a regulator. Food labelling is an EU competence, so Brexit provides an opportunity to hand back to the FSA part of its original remit. In light of the recent concerns about allergen labelling and the Prime Minister’s announcement of a review of labelling, this is surely the moment to rethink departmental roles. Furthermore, the FSA has responsibility for labelling in Northern Ireland and Wales, as does FSA Scotland north of the border. Does the Minister therefore agree that Brexit provides an ideal opportunity to bring England into line with the rest of the United Kingdom?
“within the food chain, a vast majority of vets working are of non-UK origin”.
The British Veterinary Association has said that the majority of these vets are from the EU. The committee also heard from the Equine Disease Coalition and the British Equine Veterinary Association. It was quite clear in what it told us. To quote from paragraph 126:
“A shortage of vets will have an adverse effect on disease surveillance, disease control measures, risk of disease incursions, control of an exotic disease emergency, domestic food safety, loss of high quality reputation for exports and animal disease research. This at a time when the potential loss of harmonised disease controlled trade movements between the EU and the UK will increase the need for veterinary checks and certification to maintain our biosecurity”.
With regard to the public sector in a post-Brexit world, the report acknowledges that there has been recent recruitment of staff in Defra but also urges the department to ensure that enough appropriately trained staff are dedicated to the issue of biosecurity.
The United Kingdom Government are currently engaged in the very important process of devising a new UK immigration policy, so can the Minister guarantee that people such as veterinarians, who are essential to our future biosecurity, will be on what is called the shortage occupation list, which is part of that new policy, and that their profession will be prioritised as part of the new arrangements? I am sure he will agree that no matter how good systems, inspections and regulatory checks are, they are effective only if they are policed by ample numbers of appropriately qualified men and women. I hope the Minister will give this pressing matter of sufficiency of staffing very high priority.
With regard to another aspect of biodiversity, I first thank the Minister for his apparent readiness to support the launching of a global review into the economics of biodiversity which includes biosecurity. In time, such a move might well help save countless lives and perhaps even assist with the removal of plastics from the oceans. Secondly, the initiative to increase the waters designated as marine protection areas is very welcome. The Minister will be well aware of to what extent it affects biosecurity, but it will also greatly increase conservation areas as far west as Ascension Island—conservation of sea life, as well as wildlife, will be very welcome. I wish him every good fortune in the very important task of securing renewed co-operation with other countries’ Governments to enhance environmental purposes and prospects.
Can the Minister say how matters stand with respect to gaining access to these important early alert systems? I know that other noble Lords have asked the same question of the Minister, which goes to illustrate how important we think it is that this matter is addressed and that we have clarification. Does he agree that relying solely on public websites will not substitute for the wealth of information and insight that we currently enjoy, nor the influence we currently exercise—and that that applies even if we take part in international information exchange networks like the Food Industry Intelligence Network and the WHO’s International Food Safety Authorities Network? The plan may be for the FSA to step into the breach, but it is not clear when it will be up and running and firing on all cylinders. The noble Lord, Lord Krebs, has given us a fairly comprehensive run-through of why concerns about the FSA’s role remain. As has been mentioned, it is not clear either that any shadow body that is set up in the interim, until the FSA is up and ready, will be independent of government interference and at a safe distance from the food lobby. I therefore echo the same concerns as the noble Lord, Lord Krebs.
It is frightening to think that the Government were once seriously peddling a no-deal Brexit in the knowledge that alternative arrangements for biosecurity, such as they are, were not yet in place and that the UK’s protection from animal pests and disease would have been substandard. It is also concerning that there remain on the Government Benches—and, it has to be said, the Opposition Benches—those who still extol the virtues of a no-deal Brexit. A poorer-quality early alert system, coupled with the proposal for laxer controls on borders, is a recipe for disaster and criminally negligent. Maybe it was merely political posturing and never in serious contention; one can only hope. However, the worry is that the snake-oil proponents of a no-deal Brexit are doing rather well in the polls for the Euro elections next week—a consequence of the failure of the Government and the Opposition to tackle the myth that we can have our cake and eat it, forgetting to mention the listeria or the E. coli lurking within.
The role of monitoring and enforcement is currently filled by the European Commission and the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office, which I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Trees, will cover in detail. The FVO carries out regular missions to member states to check practices and compliance with animal health, animal welfare and food safety regulations. It is a valuable independent assessor of risk management. In paragraph 38 of the report, the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board asks who will perform this function if the UK leaves. The Welsh Government Minister, Lesley Griffiths AM, said in written evidence:
“There will … need to be a body to replicate the audit and advisory support, post EU exit, currently delivered through the FVO”.
The RSPB raised an important issue about enforcement. I refer noble Lords to paragraph 39, where it said that the text of the invasive alien species regulation,
“requires Member States to report to The European Commission on a 6-yearly basis on actions taken to implement the IAS Regulation”.
The Commission therefore has the power to ensure that member states are implementing the IAS regulation and it can take enforcement action if necessary, along with the European Court of Justice. The result is that we currently have a monitoring and risk assessment agency and a Commission that has a record of taking meaningful action against transgressors.
The Minister’s response to the committee when asked about how enforcement would be dealt with post Brexit, was, if I may say so, rather lackadaisical, given the dire consequences should there be a material lapse in vigilance. The Minister in question is the same Minister who is responding on behalf of the Government today, who said to the committee:
“If we need to look at either remits or additional powers to retain our reputation and our requirements, we will look at that … We will take every opportunity, if necessary, to bolster any existing organisations”.