I rather thought that the noble Lord might take me in that direction at the end of his comments. He is absolutely right in his opening remarks about international collaboration. Whether within the European Union or the whole international family, we are subject to many conventions, and are considered world-leading. We have not got it all right. There are many lessons to be learned. I am very keen that we heighten biosecurity. Candidly, I see our mission on this as a global reach. Yes, our partnership with our very close neighbours and friends is going to be absolutely crucial as we all deal with invasive species, pests and diseases, because these species do not respect any border. That is precisely why our next set of instruments deal with a single epidemiological unit on the island of Ireland. This is a subject I could get a little carried away on.
I say to my noble friend Lord Deben that I absolutely understand about African swine fever. I receive regular commentary on its devastating impact, not only in
central and eastern Europe and into Russia, but in China. It is a very dangerous and damaging disease, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, is right to say that all pig producers in this country are very worried indeed about it. That is why we are raising awareness through the newspapers and magazines in many languages for workers from eastern Europe, saying that they must not bring pork products back with them, for instance. We must raise awareness of personal biosecurity because of the outbreaks in the Czech Republic and Belgium. Although it has not been confirmed in the Belgian outbreak it is certain that, as I have said before, in the Czech Republic it was a loose connection to someone discarding a pork product. We need to be absolutely clear on that.
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The Forestry Commission and others are absolutely seized of the imperative of managing the wild boar population because much damage is being done to ecosystems. Much damage is also being done to people’s properties, to playing fields and graveyards; there are all sorts of examples where a population that is not managed or properly controlled is causing damage. I think that many local residents who so applauded the arrival of the wild boar are now deeply concerned about this. I therefore assure my noble friend Lord Deben, who referred to internal measures, that, yes, we see the responsibility for that. This would not be just about African swine fever; can one imagine an outbreak—pray God it does not happen—of foot and mouth in west Gloucestershire? As I said in a previous debate, we need to think maturely about how we deal with that.
The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, referred to Dutch elm disease and ash dieback. The great thing is that the research undertaken by John Innes at Norwich gives us some hope about the ash. It has a much wider DNA and genome, and there is more confidence that people will be able to find tolerant strains. Although, very sadly, there will be a large number of losses over time we should remain hopeful about how we can deal with retaining the ash in our landscape. Regarding Japanese knotweed, the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, has tabled a Question on that for Thursday and I look forward to it. However, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, that we should take advantage of the buffer that we have; we should undertake that with rigour.
My noble friend Lord Elton asked about the progress of disease in the United States and the UK. I will use this opportunity to say that I am not aware of precisely what work is being undertaken in the United States. The point about the instrument before us is to reassure your Lordships that the rigour of the heat treatment, and all the treatments required for ash coming in from Canada and the United States, is retained and will be most important.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, raised an important point which I ought to go through. Instruments go through the normal checking process for draft SIs, including having second and third pairs of eyes checking them, involving Defra’s and other government lawyers. They are also then scrutinised by the JCSI. All government departments have rigorous
checking procedures for EU-exit SIs and, as I have said before, Defra regrets that these errors have arisen despite its checking process. I can say to the noble and learned Lord and the noble Baroness that Defra’s legal director is working with colleagues on any lessons that we can learn. Clearly, we want to prevent any similar errors. As I have said, I take responsibility for those errors so far as your Lordships are concerned, but I also have a responsibility to ensure that the statute book is correct. I cannot give a cast-iron guarantee that there will be none in these instruments and, conceivably, in business-as-usual instruments in the future. I am afraid that it is part of the human condition that perfection is sometimes difficult to achieve. All I would say is that your Lordships were very generous in a previous debate about how much work had gone into this enormous range of statutory instruments.
The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, asked about the “small quantity” issue. These amendments contain exemptions for prohibitions and requirements in the Plant Health (England) Order 2015 and the Plant Health (Forestry) Order 2005, allowing a person to bring a small quantity of regulated plant material into England from the EU, in their passenger baggage. The amendments are based on the current exemptions for plant material from the EU and intend to replicate the current exemptions only. The meaning of “small quantity” is not defined, and the JCSI noted that relying on “small quantity” to define the scope of the exemptions makes it difficult to know, with certainty, when the exemptions will apply and, therefore, whether a person is committing an offence. The JCSI also accepts that the department is entitled to reach the view that it is outside the scope of the powers conferred under Section 8(1) of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act.
In referring to the Be Plant Wise campaign and “check, clean, dry”, I am keen that we return to this issue. As I have been saying, not only to your Lordships but more widely at biosecurity events, my strong advice is not to bring anything back. This is the legislation, and what we are bringing back to make it operable. I raise the point of the noble Lord, Lord Hylton: are these not areas of the regime that we should think of addressing, whatever happens? The numbers on the plant risk register are increasing, because of the way the global market and biosecurity work. We need to think strongly about that.
The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, made a number of points. If I have missed any or their spirit, I will return to them by letter. On access to EU systems and information-sharing, all these areas within the EU, United Kingdom and the world must inter-relate, because we are not a citadel. We want to trade. We need a market for our goods and those coming in. In managing that, there is precedence for third-country access to EU notification systems. It is something we seek to negotiate. Our own UK-wide horizon-scanning team will continue to gather intelligence on risk. The noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, was generous on this area.
I will say tomorrow that I am “ferocious” about these matters. We need to look at this much more stringently within this country, with our friends and partners in the European Union and more widely.
Great damage has been done by invasive species. Great damage is done by plants and animals with diseases. That is why we have a strong protocol and want to continue to have it. I am most grateful to all noble Lords for their generosity.