Julian elected to Parliament’s Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee
September 7, 2017
On Tuesday, Julian was elected to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee of the House of Commons by his parliamentary colleagues. The Committee has an important role in scrutinising government activity on environmental, agricultural and rural matters, and in investigating important issues within its remit, and has powers to examine official papers and take oral evidence from witnesses to aid its enquiries.
The Committee’s remit includes many significant issues for York Outer, including flood risk, preserving the natural environment, air quality, and farming, as well as important national matters like animal welfare. The environment and agriculture are also some of the areas that will be most significantly affected by the Brexit process, and the Committee will play a vital role in holding the government to account over its plans for new policies in these areas.
Following his election, Julian said “I was delighted to be elected to the EFRA Committee, which will provide new opportunities for me to raise important issues affecting residents in York Outer, and have a greater input on future UK environment and farming policy post-Brexit. I firmly believe we need a Brexit settlement that maintains and improves protection of our precious natural environment, and maintains the world-leading high standards of UK agriculture, and I intend to make use of my professional experience of farming to help bring this about.
I am also very clear that the government must work on this while continuing to tackle important ongoing issues of pollution, flood risk, rural life opportunities, and food security. I look forward to being able to build on my previous work on animal welfare, like my Control of Horses Act 2015 which addressed the terrible problem of fly grazing.”
