Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60-79)
ENVIRONMENT AGENCY
14 DECEMBER 2005
Q60 Mr Ellwood: If I can move over
to the Sustainable Communities: Homes for All publication
by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the Five Year Action
Plan, could you give the committee a general overview of your
impression of this document?
Sir John Harman: Can I hand over
to Ms Gilder at this point, partly because of my throat but partly
because she is better placed to answer that?
Ms Gilder: We have been tracking
the progress of Sustainable Communities as a Government
policy for some time so the publication of the Five Year Plan
is just one punctuation mark in a policy development area that
has been going on for three or four years now. Our honest interpretation
to Government and to this committee is that for all of these things
the devil is in the detail—global figures about housing
numbers, the extra 200,000 posed in the Sustainable Communities
plan, the ones that we saw last week for the Barker response,
an extra 50,000 homes by 2016. So much in terms of the environmental
dimension depends on where those homes go, the infrastructure
that supports them and the standards to which they are built.
As we found with your previous questioning, there is that dependency
and connectivity between all those things. Our approach since
publication of that document and before has been to argue for
better recognition of the environmental risks associated with
poor location of new homes, making sure the environmental infrastructure,
some of which probably is less glamorous than others if you are
talking about sewage pipes as much as flood risk and roads and
schools, is in place in advance of the houses going in. Thirdly,
and what we have already been focusing on in the first part of
this discussion, is the standards to which those homes are built.
Q61 Mr Ellwood: That is interesting
because the response by a number of NGOs, including the organisation
we have just heard from, has not been very promising at all. There
has been a discrepancy between the Sustainable Communities
approach and that of sustainable development. There is a slightly
different emphasis on whether you focus on developing from a sustainable
position or whether it is involving the community as a whole on
the direction in which you go and also the stress on whether it
is voluntary or best practice or whether it should be slightly
more draconian. The feedback that we have had from a number of
non-governmental organisations is that they have not been very
impressed with this. You say this particular publication is a
benchmark or a line in the sand, but it is actually an indictment
of the direction in which we are currently going and the progress
we have made. I am getting the impression that you too find that
you have reservations as to what has been achieved in this key
area so far.
Ms Gilder: We have experience
of not only the base line of housing growth that is planned for
the south and east of England and now the Sustainable Communities
level of growth on top of that and potentially more with the Government's
response to the Barker Review. What we are finding is that there
are gritty issues that have to be tackled. We are an independent
adviser to Government and we have made the case when we feel a
development will result in environmental problems and deterioration
which is probably not acceptable. In most of those cases, and
I have to say they are relatively few, we have had fairly thorough
and frank and honest discussions with Government and in many of
those cases I think we can come away saying that we helped negotiate
a better solution as a result. I think it is important to be honest
and mature about these things and say that there are going to
be gritty issues and we need to tackle them, not pretend that
there are not any because that does not get us very far at all.
Q62 Mr Ellwood: Can I try and tease
out of you whether or not you would advise a more robust approach?
In your evidence you have made a comment about the fact that over
30% of homes do not comply with building regulations. Do you see
that there is scope for us to have building regulations in force
in a much tougher style than we currently have?
Ms Gilder: Yes. It is interesting
that we do focus on building regulations in terms of upping the
standard. If we up the standard without thinking about compliance
we may find that we do not deliver necessarily anything that is
better on the ground. I know the Government is thinking long and
hard about the future of building regulations in the round but
one thing is for sure: if there are 30% of homes (and some people
think it is more than that) that are currently built which do
not comply with building regulations that is a pretty worrying
aspect. Our argument is, as well as looking at improving the regulatory
floor, particularly in some areas where there is not a good regulatory
floor like water efficiency, the code for sustainable homes as
it is now called, to really pull up and develop a much more innovative
approach by industry and compliance, you start to get a better
package. These things have to be looked at as a broad package
of measures that have to go forward.
Q63 David Howarth: On building regulations
compliance, do you think there might be a problem in the way building
regulations are enforced? The system which I still think of as
the new system where there is competition between various building
inspectors to supply the servers of building regulation inspection—do
you think that is the right model if we move to a far more environmental
regulation model of what building regulations are supposed to
do?
Sir John Harman: There is an even
bigger change. The building regulations are now being asked to
do a number of things about how the house performs after it is
built. The system was created to mostly control the building process.
That shift of emphasis automatically means that there needs to
be a good look at exactly what building regulation inspectors
are trained and skilled to do. I happen to believe that the system
is rather under-resourced but there is a shift of emphasis which
is going to have to reflect itself in practice. That is regardless
of whether you have the previous system or this competitive system
and that is very relevant.
Q64 David Howarth: One possible relevance
is that, because of the element of competition, the resource that
goes into building regulations inspections between local authorities
is constantly being put under pressure. I remember when I was
leader of a council I was constantly under pressure to reduce
costs in that area because otherwise they would not get the business
at all.
Sir John Harman: That is also
true. It is all recovered from fees and therefore you have to
be competitive in the market.
Q65 Mr Ellwood: You mentioned in
your memorandum that the ODPM was conducting a review of the incentives
for improving the efficiency of existing stock. That was announced
in September. Are you involved in that review?
Ms Gilder: We are very interested
in the review. We are not one of the original founding members
of that group. When it was originally announced, it was an ODPM,
Defra and Treasury tripartite arrangement. Since then you will
not be surprised that we have made advances to ODPM saying we
think we have something to offer that group. They will be looking
to us to contribute our input, particularly on retrofitting for
water efficiency, where we have quite a considerable level of
expertise. We will be looking at some of the broader issues.
Q66 Mr Ellwood: You have not been
formally invited to participate in the review?
Ms Gilder: No. We have seen the
terms of reference so we know what scope that group will cover.
Q67 Mr Ellwood: Do you know if it
includes private housing?
Ms Gilder: It does because that
is where the bulk of the savings from retrofitting will sit.
Q68 Mr Ellwood: Do you know when
the review is due back?
Ms Gilder: From memory, it is
a fairly speedy piece of work. I can ask my colleagues in Defra
and the ODPM to make you aware of the timetable for that.
Q69 Mr Ellwood: My final question
is to do with your comment to us regarding the work the ODPM is
doing in relation to flood resilience in building and building
regulations. Can you update us on how this is progressing and
if there is anything emerging from a concrete perspective?
Ms Gilder: The work we are doing
with the ODPM is essentially starting to test materials that we
could specify through building regulations that are flood resilient.
Having done some research in preparation for today, my understanding
is that we are building and helping to fund test facilities to
look at the resilience of certain materials against certain levels
of flooding so that those materials could be specified in building
regulations. We are doing the early analysis work.
Q70 Mr Ellwood: We will not see anything
for a little while?
Ms Gilder: It is probably a programme
of liaison with the ODPM that goes on over about a two-year period
but I will check that and report back.
Q71 Joan Walley: It would reassure
me to know whether or not that work includes the idea of water
efficiency savings and is not just looking at the use of water
or the amount of water that is needed, but ways in which water
usage can be prevented.
Ms Gilder: The work on flood resilience
we are doing with the ODPM is for incorporation in building regulations
at some point in the future. The Government is already committed
to including water efficiency in either building regulations or
water fittings regulations.
Q72 Joan Walley: The Environment
Agency is able to give assurances that the amount of work that
might be needed on that score which was referred to in the previous
session is being already included in the remit?
Ms Gilder: Of the retrofitting
group?
Q73 Joan Walley: Both groups.
Ms Gilder: I can reassure you
on the remit of the retrofitting group that water is included,
looking at existing homes. We are also quite reassured by the
Government's statement last Monday to look at water efficiency
in all new homes.
Sir John Harman: That means delivering
both through building regulations and water fitting regulations.
Part of it at least must go through building regulations. In relation
to Mr Ellwood's first point on the sustainable communities plan,
it so much depends on location. It is very hard for us to comment
just on sheer numbers. For instance, Pam referred to specific
areas where we have been able to do work. We might have been asked
to do it earlier, but Corby is a case in point. Twenty-something
thousand houses were proposed but we have had to do at least a
year's work to establish what the water cycle requirements are
for Corby. It would have been better had that been done ahead
of time but it has demonstrated that there was a problem with
that particular proposal. It has had to be resolved. It has delayed
some of the timescales for development but it has been resolved.
Until you see it side by side almost, it is very hard to know
what the impacts are going to be. That is not on the houses' performance
as houses; it is on their sewerage requirements, their water supply
requirements, flood defences and so forth. One thing we did welcome
last week was the announcement that we are going to be involved
in at least the first screening of locations. That is an advance
because up to now we have been kind of catching up. It is really
important that we identify where it is going to be so difficult
to provide the proper infrastructure that it is really not worth
going there.
Joan Walley: If there are other issues
that relate to the site-specific nature of where you need to be
involved at the earlier stage and you think there are other issues
which could be raised within the remit of our inquiry, we would
be very happy to have that from you because that site-specific
nature is very important.
Q74 David Howarth: We are talking
quite a lot about the Government's response to Barker. I was wondering
whether you have been involved in discussions with the Treasury
and the ODPM in the run up to the government's response?
Ms Gilder: We were involved in
several ways. I sat on one of the official sub-groups that looked
at the Barker work and we were one of a rather extended number
of stakeholders involved in the sustainability study that the
government commissioned, which was another document that was published
last Monday.
Q75 David Howarth: Is there anything
else about the response to the Barker Review that you want to
mention now that came out of that work or the response itself?
Ms Gilder: To reiterate the point
that we have already made, the devil will be in the detail of
a lot of this. Although the sustainability report looked at the
environmental impact and the social impact of extra Barker numbers,
they were only looking at the extra on top of an existing, quite
pressurised environment in some parts of the country, particularly
in the south east. They were not location specific and that will
always, for us, be a very important aspect. They did not cover
necessarily all of the things that we are finding through our
day to day work are important about water quality as much as water
resources, sewage as much as flood risk. It is interesting early
information that we can use but we have to think about this as
something that will go on and on until we see the devil in the
detail about where these individual homes will go.
Q76 Dr Turner: Your memo is very
concerned about infrastructure investment. You say that for secure,
sustained investment the government needs to get resources from
private and public sources so that environmental infrastructure
can overcome the predicted environmental impacts of development.
You go on to say that this investment must be planned ahead and
even be a precondition of growth. Is the government doing this?
Sir John Harman: It is not doing
it as well as it might. Yes, it is doing some of it but, to go
back to the Corby example, a solution is being found. The problem
in Corby is that you want to put nearly 30,000 houses on top of
an area with no main river to take away the sewage. In order to
find a solution, it requires quite a lot of work with Catalyst
Corby, the borough council, the government office, water companies
and so forth. Yes, that work is being done. It ought to have been
foreseen a bit earlier. It ought to be a bit more systematic,
that we are going to sort these things out in advance. That is
what I took to be the intent of last Monday's announcement on
this, which we welcome. To some extent, these things are being
thought about later than they should be. The three areas for us
are the sewage and drainage infrastructure, flood defence and
water supply. Water supply is very difficult. You can get so much
in terms of good standards for housing from water efficiency and
management but it is very hard to guess how much you are going
to get in the timescale in which you would have to develop new
resources. You quoted our evidence where we said we thought that,
of the dozen or so proposals in water company plans for new reservoirs,
maybe four or five will come to pass but not soon. There is much
talk of an upper Thames reservoir. That could take, in any reasonable
estimate, until 2020 to have in place. On something like that
you need a lot of foresight. We can provide the committee with
details of where, in the south east of England, the water supply
areas are in good balance and there is a good excess of supply
over development and where that is much thinner. I am sure you
have seen these maps. In many supply areas there is sufficient
headroom for development. Given that the water resource plans
for the water companies are 20 year plans anyway, there is in
no case an issue where we are going to hit the buffers in the
next couple of years. We need to see what is going to be extended,
particularly in the Thames region, to extend the supply side or
to meet new demand. That was the reason Thames Water brought forward
recently a proposal for a desalination plant in the estuary. There
are short term fixes and long term fixes. If you are going to
require a long term fix, you need to start in good time. The issue
of water supply is one where the timescale is most challenging.
Q77 Dr Turner: Would it be fair to
say that the work should have started at least two years ago if
you are going to get the results in time?
Sir John Harman: To some extent
the work should have started 15 years ago, but I do not know that
I would put a particular date on it. There is an issue in that
water companies have to make a return on capital. They are not
going to make unnecessary investment, quite rightly, and there
is an economic regulator that oversees that. The five year price
settlements are not the ideal mechanism for planning 20-year infrastructures.
I think it would be helpful to have a look at the infrastructure
planning up to SR2007, to have a longer term framework of investment
intent within which these decisions could be taken.
Q78 Dr Turner: The water companies
have to agree with you their 25-year water resource plans so there
is an opportunity for you to pick up a lot of these issues there.
Have you been satisfied with their plans?
Sir John Harman: When we are not
we say so. The last generation of water resource plans had our
approval after a degree of coming and going between ourselves
and different water companies. Since then things have moved on.
The sustainable communities plan has come along; the Barker numbers
have now come along as well. The last approved plans are now shorter.
They were adequate at the time but, talking about the whole conglomerate
of Environment Agency, water companies, government and so on,
if we had foreseen the housing growth that was needed, we would
have sought to have approved greater supply requirements. That
was then but the next review is going to have to demonstrate how
supply is going to be extended or demand management is going to
be extended or both in order to meet reasonable supply development
plans. It is quite tight.
Q79 Dr Turner: This rather suggests
that there is an urgent need to draw up a completely new set of
resource plans. Is that happening?
Sir John Harman: I think the cycle
is due to recur in three years' time. I can check that.
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