Daniel Zeichner, MP for Cambridge since 2015, was appointed as a Shadow Minister in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) on Wednesday.

Zeichner will work alongside Luke Pollard, the Shadow Defra secretary, in the final months of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership.

Zeichner has served on several parliamentary committees and internal Labour bodies, including the Labour Party’s national environment campaign, SERA, and is a Vice-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Climate Change. He is a strong supporter of the European Union, and in 2017 he resigned from his position as Shadow Minister for Transport in protests over the Labour Party’s position on Brexit.

As an environmental advocate, Zeichner has particularly championed the protection and stewardship of bees. His appointment follows his campaigning in Parliament for a ban on neonicotinoids (a pesticide) due to their harmful effects on bees, which became an EU wide ban in 2018, and his leading of a debate in Parliament in last June to ban non-recyclable and unsustainable food packaging.

Zeichner commented on his appointment: “I’m a lifelong environmentalist and have an enduring interest in agriculture and food issues and, as many people know, I’m a bee fan, campaigning to make sure bee-killing pesticides are not used on our fields.”

Central to Zeichner’s role will be directing Labour’s position on the Government’s delayed Agricultural Bill. The Agricultural Bill aims to minimise the environmental impact of food production post-Brexit. The Bill is focused around environmental sustainability as well as the sustainability of supply chains for farmers.

Commenting on the process and importance of the Agricultural Bill, Zeichner remarked, “after the heart-breaking vote to leave the EU, I am very concerned that the Government has wasted almost eighteen months since the Bill was first introduced and we now have a very short time to get new systems in place, thanks to the foolish decision by Boris Johnson not to seek a longer extension to the negotiations with the EU.”

Zeichner may only hold this shadow ministerial position until April, when the next Labour Party leader is selected.

Zeichner was re-elected as Cambridge’s Labour MP in December 2019, winning 48% of the total voting share.