Bees

My Lords, it might appeal to the Minister, but bee inspectors have to be trained and need expertise. Transforming volunteers into effective bee inspectors is quite a challenge. I emphasise that the National Bee Unit is a serious unit, on which we rely a great deal as one of the weapons that we are deploying to tackle the issues that we face. The main activities are inspection and enforcement. The bee inspectors are out in the field, controlling notifiable pests and diseases. The unit is responsible for research and development. It also has that crucial role of communication, which the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, suggested needed to be fulfilled as effectively as possible. It has a crucial role in advising beekeepers, which is a significant task. The unit contributes to the evidence-based policy development, including identifying risks to bee health from current and emerging threats. The National Bee Unit is critical to this challenging issue that we all face. The noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, identified for the House aspects of government activity in terms of the Healthy Bees plan, which the Government published in March after considerable publicity. The plan comes from the recognition that honey bees are facing a number of threats from pests and diseases. It gives direction and focus for the Government, beekeepers and other stakeholders to work together to respond effectively to the threats and to sustain honey bees and beekeeping now and in the future. There is no doubt that the challenge to beekeepers is significant. The plan, as rightly identified by the noble Lord, sets out to keep pests, disease and other hazards to as low a level as possible. It sets out standards of good beekeeping and seeks to establish effective biosecurity to prevent the spread of pests and diseases. It will ensure that everything that we do is underpinned by sound science and evidence. I shall come on to the science in a moment, because the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, and other noble Lords put great emphasis on the research aspect, which is of the greatest importance. Of course, the plan is an attempt to get everyone to work together on a common problem, or I should say problems, because we do not know what the individual problem is. The challenge is enormous. In response, on top of the current £1.3 million a year that is allocated, the National Bee Unit will receive an additional £2.3 million over two years, which will be used for the following three priorities. The first is to get a more accurate picture of the numbers and distribution of beekeepers and a robust assessment of the health of their colonies, which presupposes that it will address the issues raised by the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, of effective communication. Its second priority is to increase learning opportunities, because by definition, if we have an extraordinarily enthusiastic but nevertheless amateur industry on the whole, it is very important to support, educate and encourage beekeepers in good husbandry. Prevention is, after all, better than cure.