The Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has appointed former health secretary Steve Barclay as the new Secretary of State for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). This comes after former Defra Secretary, Thérèse Coffey, who was appointed in October 2022 stood down as part of a government cabinet reshuffle.
A qualified solicitor, Steve Barclay was elected as a Conservative MP for North East Cambridgeshire in May 2010 following a career in financial services. He has had several governmental roles including Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union (2018-2020), Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (2021-2022) and Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (2022-2023).
Trudy Harrison has also left her post as Minister for Natural Environment and Land Use which included forestry, tree planting, land use and climate change adaptation. The remit of Defra’s Rebecca Pow, Minister for Environmental Quality and Resilience, now includes forestry. Pow was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at Defra in October 2022 and has represented the constituency Taunton Deane in Somerset since 2015.
In addition, Robbie Moore, Conservative MP for Keighley in West Yorkshire since December 2019, was appointed as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State but his responsibilities have not yet been confirmed.
