Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs written question – answered at on 31 October 2025.
Neil Duncan-Jordan
Independent, Poole
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make an assessment with Cabinet colleagues of the potential impact of trends in the number of manufacturers using imported virgin plastic on (a) the environment and (b) revenues to the Exchequer.
Mary Creagh
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
There is currently no planned assessment regarding the potential impact of trends in the number of manufacturers using imported virgin plastic on the environment.
HM Treasury and HM Revenue and Customs are currently evaluating the Plastic Packaging Tax, using analysis of environmental and tax data to assess the impact of the tax and will update in due course. Forecasts on tax revenues are published regularly by the Office for Budget Responsibility.
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Secretary of State was originally the title given to the two officials who conducted the Royal Correspondence under Elizabeth I. Now it is the title held by some of the more important Government Ministers, for example the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
The cabinet is the group of twenty or so (and no more than 22) senior government ministers who are responsible for running the departments of state and deciding government policy.
It is chaired by the prime minister.
The cabinet is bound by collective responsibility, which means that all its members must abide by and defend the decisions it takes, despite any private doubts that they might have.
Cabinet ministers are appointed by the prime minister and chosen from MPs or peers of the governing party.
However, during periods of national emergency, or when no single party gains a large enough majority to govern alone, coalition governments have been formed with cabinets containing members from more than one political party.
War cabinets have sometimes been formed with a much smaller membership than the full cabinet.
From time to time the prime minister will reorganise the cabinet in order to bring in new members, or to move existing members around. This reorganisation is known as a cabinet re-shuffle.
The cabinet normally meets once a week in the cabinet room at Downing Street.
