HC Deb 30 March 2004 vol 419 cc84-6WS
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr. Ben Bradshaw)

The Department has carried out a review of the basis for charging for a number of plant health, plant varieties and animal health services that it provides. Invoicing for the services concerned was suspended whilst the review was completed.

The review focused on whether the legislative basis for making charges for these services was adequate. The conclusion is that for the following services the legislative basis was not sufficient to allow the Department to impose a charge:

Plant Health

  1. Export certificates for plants and plant products
  2. Seed potatoes: approved stock scheme
  3. Seed potatoes: fees for inspection of pre-basic seed potatoes
  4. Seed potatoes: fees for investigation of complaints

Plant Varieties and Seeds

  1. Provisional seed certification scheme
  2. Seed samplers' and crop inspectors' examinations
  3. Examination of seed analysts
  4. Additional costs of meeting statutory consent conditions for GM crop varieties in national list trials
  5. OECD /ISTA certification
  6. Purity and germination tests
  7. Special tests for distinctness, uniformity and stability

Animal Health

  1. Certain aspects of the Poultry Health Scheme
  2. Factory Inspection Scheme
  3. Additional animal health certification issued in connection with the Classical Swine Fever outbreak in 2000.

A parallel review of Forestry Commission services has found that the legislative base for export charges of forest trees and forest products was not sufficient to impose a charge. Invoicing for this service was also suspended whilst the review was completed.

Action will now be taken to repay to customers some £2.4 million of charges that were levied over the six years prior to the suspension of charging. To take this forward, the Department and the Forestry Commission will be writing over the coming weeks to those organisations and individuals who are to be repaid.

Indicator 2004–05 Target
1. Deliver the programme of improvements to the strategic road network. Achieve:
— At least 440 progress points for the Ml, M6 and M25 schemes, compared to 2003–04 forecast score of 250.
— At least 95 per cent. of the major schemes progress points required to reach the score of 6,500 compared to the 2003–04 forecast score of 4,590.
— Complete 20 of 26 priority action sites at junctions.
2. Deliver a demonstrable reduction in incident-related congestion and minimisation of road works-related congestion. In establishing the Regional Control Centres (RCCs), achieve:
—West Midlands RCC and traffic officers commence service. Achieve 92 of 100 points.
—140 of 155 progress points for all other RCCs and traffic officers.
Establish and implement a management system to monitor and report on incident-related congestion in the West Midlands.
3. Make information available to influence travel behaviour and inform decisions. —Make publicly available by March 2005—and maintain thereafter—traffic information for the Agency's network through a website and a dedicated voice recognition interactive telephone service.
—Provide by March 2005—and maintain thereafter—on the Agency's motorway network, strategic route advice using the variable message signs (VMS) available, for all incidents causing more than 15 minutes predicted delay, and monitor its accuracy.
4. Deliver the Agency's agreed proportion of the national target. By 2010 reduce by a third (i.e. to 3,327) the number of people killed/seriously injured on trunk roads compared with the 1994–98 average of 4,991. Reduce by at least 832 to 4,159.
5. Maintain the network in a safe and serviceable condition. Achieve a road surface condition index score of 100 ±1
6. Mitigate the potentially adverse impact of strategic roads and take opportunities to enhance the environment taking into account value for money. Achieve at least 95 per cent. Across the five sub targets:
— Air Quality: Improve quality of at least two air quality management areas (AQMA) sites.
— Biodiversity: Achieve at least 5 per cent. of the Agency's Biodiversity Action Plan extending across 15 priority targets.
—Landscape: Introduce no less than four planning schemes.
— Noise: Treat at least 50 lane km of concrete road surface with lower noise surfacing.
— Water: Treat at least five outfalls identified as posing a pollution risk to watercourses.
7. Deliver a high level of road user satisfaction. Achieve from the road user satisfaction survey an average annual score of at least 85 per cent. for motorways and at least 80 per cent. for trunk roads.

Where required, work is underway to introduce the necessary legislation for future charging for the services affected.

The review concluded that the necessary legal base was in place to How charging for plant health propagation scheme services provided by the Department. Charging for this service will recommence from this coming season.

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