Defra’s annual report and accounts 2014 to 2015 – released via the Defra website
These accounts make interesting reading for an anorak like me. As is often the case these sort of arid documents are more revealing in terms of what they don’t say. One of Defra’s priorities is championing the countryside and improving rural services but apart from a short paragraph on rural proofing and work with DCLG to increase the overall rural funding element of the Local Government Funding Settlement 2015–16 from £11.5 million to £15.5 million there doesn’t appear to detail any significant activities over this period. All of which fuels my theory that the department has all but given up any interest in rural communities in favour of a focus on science and farming.
Liz Truss says as much in her foreword, which identifies:
“The core purposes of Defra are to support economic growth by promoting a thriving and internationally successful food and farming sector, to improve the natural environment and to provide security to homes and businesses against the threats of flooding and animal and plant disease.”