Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs – in the Senedd at 1:44 pm on 27 March 2019.

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Photo of Andrew RT Davies Andrew RT Davies Conservative 1:44, 27 March 2019

Regrettably, this does seem to be regulation by e-mail, to be honest, with a press story, rather than a proper assessment, because, obviously, the Government, to its credit, had been working with the industry and had indicated that they'd reached a satisfactory accommodation with the industry on how a voluntary approach would be best suited to tackle these pollution incidences. I accept the point that we need to take action, and the industry itself accepts that point. But if you take it on a step further and you do actually implement these across country—and they are virtually a cut-and-paste of the NVZ regulations—when other parts of the United Kingdom, such as Northern Ireland, introduced similar measures 10 years ago—there was a comprehensive package of support to allow the industry to make that transition, of 60 per cent support from that particular administration in Northern Ireland—we've also got to make sure that the planning system works in unison and doesn't actually block these improvements. So, accepting that you will bring forward these regulations, how will you be seeking to make sure that the planning system works with the industry and the new regulations, and, importantly, that there is support there to make the transition that other parts of the United Kingdom have put forward to help their agricultural industries?