APPENDIX 9
Memorandum submitted
by Hampshire County Council (F15)
This Memorandum of Evidence is submitted to
the Inquiry in response to the recommendation in the Ministry
of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Comprehensive Spending Review
report to the Treasury that the responsibility for the delivery
of flood and coast protection schemes be removed from local authorities
and placed in the hands of either the Environment Agency or a
new agency. It is understood that this issue will be debated at
the House of Commons Agriculture Committee Inquiry.
Hampshire has a long and varied coastline, with
low lying areas at risk from flooding and sections of eroding
cliffs. The County Council owns more than 1,600 hectares of land
on the coast, including three country parks and several nature
reserves. Coastal defence is therefore a matter of great interest
to the County Council, which has a Coastal Conservation Panel
of elected members to address coastal issues.
When it published A Strategy for Hampshire's
Coast in 1991, the County Council expressed concern that the fragmentation
of responsibilities for coast protection and sea defence inhibited
moves towards a co-ordinated, long-term, strategic approach to
coastal defence planning. However, great strides have been made
towards the desired approach, to the extent that our earlier concern
about fragmentation no longer exists.
The main reasons for the improvements that have
occured in recent years are:
(1) the formation and achievements of SCOPAC
(the Standing Conference on Problems Associated with the Coastline),
the first regional coastal group in the country. SCOPAC brings
together local authorities, MAFF, the Environment Agency and other
interests along the central south coast to ensure that coastal
defence schemes are planned on a strategic, co-operative basis.
By involving elected members it has political accountability,
although it is not an executive body. SCOPAC has spent around
£500,000 on research in the past 10 years.
(2) the preparation of shoreline management
plans (SMPs), led by the local authorities, to provide a strategic
framework for coastal defence planning for coastal cells which
are based on natural processes and not administrative boundaries.
By establishing a partnership between key agencies, SMPs avoid
a piecemeal approach to coastal defence.
This system is now working well and it is disappointing
to hear that there are moves afoot to drastically change it. In
my view there is a strong case for keeping coastal defence responsibilities
with local government, because:
(1) local authorities have extensive knowledge
and understanding of local conditions and trends;
(2) local authorities are best placed to
relate coastal defence planning to a wide range of other issues,
especially matters for which they have responsibility, for example:
land use planning and development control; conservation of the
built and natural environment; leisure, recreation and tourism;
highways and rights of way; seaside town regeneration; countryside
management; and environmental health;
(3) as acknowledged by central government,
local authorities play a key role in the coordination and development
of coastal policies and plans and a major contribution to the
delivery of integrated coastal planning and management; and
(4) local authorities consult local communities
about coast protection schemes and are accountable for their policies
and decisions.
Removal of the coast protection function would
diminish the ability of local authorities to contribute to a wide
range of coastal initiatives and to plans for sustainable development,
and it would have serious effect on progress in integrated coastal
planning and management. The MAFF proposal would transfer responsibility
for coast protection to an agency which is far less accountable
for its actions than are local authorities, counter to the wishes
of government for greater local determination of priorities.
In conclusion:
(1) Coast protection can be delivered most
effectively by local authorities;
(2) Transfer of coast protection responsibilities
to the Environment Agency or a new agency would result in a serious
loss of accountability for decisions which involve substantial
expenditure of public money and which might affect significant
numbers of people, and in a substantial weakening of the valuable
role of local authorities in coastal planning and management;
and
(3) The Environment Agency should continue
to administer those functions where it has particular expertise,
ie flood defence, land drainage and river management.
It is worth making the point that local authorities
and the Environment Agency work well together in the field of
coastal defence, as well as in many other fields, and that this
partnership will be strengthened further when the protocol on
flood defence, currently in draft form, has been agreed between
the LGA and the Environment Agency.
The County Council believes, therefore, that
the current arrangements for the administration of sea defence
and coast protection should remain broadly the same, and that
any proposals for improvements to the current system should be
subject to full consultation with affected interests.
16 April 1998
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