Examination of Witnesses (Questions 480
- 484)
WEDNESDAY 28 NOVEMBER 2007
MR STEPHEN
HADDRILL, MR
IGAL MAYER
AND MRS
BRIDGET MCINTYRE
Q480 Paddy Tipping:
Sure. I am not sticking up for the Government, but you told them
in the summer, in June, that 750 was enough, now you are saying
800 is not enough and you are not at this stage prepared to speculate
what really is needed in 2010-11.
Mr Haddrill: I think we have learnt
the lesson from the summer that we actually do not know as much
as we ought to know. We are going to take that learning and produce
what we believe is a better evidence-based figure.
Chairman: I am going to adjourn the Committee,
because we are two minutes before a vote. My colleagues will get
a two-minute start, but could I ask them to come back as quickly
as possible and, Paddy, would you like to carry on thereafter
about Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems. The Committee stands
adjourned until we can get back as quick as we can after the vote
at a quarter past four.
The Committee suspended from 4.15 pm to
4.25 pm for a division in the House
Q481 Paddy Tipping:
We have talked quite a lot about urban drainage problems and flash
flooding and it has been said that SUDs, Sustainable Drainage
Systems, can make a difference. Is that your view?
Mr Haddrill: I think it is an
idea that has merit. We are very happy to explore any option that
can be put in place efficiently and effectively in terms of cost
and which will work, so we are quite open to that suggestion.
Q482 Paddy Tipping:
And are there insurance issues around that, or you would just
take that as mainstream business?
Mr Haddrill: I am not aware of
any insurance issues but obviously companies would want to assess
the risk in each individual case.
Q483 Paddy Tipping:
Earlier on we were talking again about urban flooding. It is not
entirely clear, because there is a multiplicity of different agencies
involved, who is responsible for what. I got the impression at
one point, Mr Haddrill, you were suggesting the Environment Agency
ought to have an over-arching view on this, is that right?
Mr Haddrill: That is our view,
yes, that there should certainly be an agency that can take an
over-arching view, and be responsible for bringing all the parties
together. It does not necessarily have to control all the systems
but it has to be able to co-ordinate action.
Q484 Chairman:
Mr Haddrill, just to conclude on your evidence, I think you wanted
to correct a small fact from our earlier exchanges.
Mr Haddrill: Yes. I am not so
sure it is that small actually. I said that the statement of principles
did not cover small business—it does, although it does not
cover it in the same way as it covers the householder. In particular
the difference is that if the business changes hands then there
is not a commitment necessarily to continue the cover to the new
businessman as there is to a new householder, and that is because
the nature of the risk around what the new business is going to
do and what the record of the business person is, is taken into
account. But what we do not have is any standard definition of
a small business.
Chairman: We touched briefly on
the question of mapping, and it might just be helpful for the
Committee if you were able to write to us with a little more detail
about some of the differences between the Environment Agency's
mapping and the mapping you have developed for your own specific
uses, and the integration of that, for example, with better meteorological
information, taking into account not just the probability of the
one-in-so-many-years event but the point you referred to, namely
the current intensity, which seems to be a factor that is missing
in delineating potentially risky areas, because it seems that
we are getting perhaps one-in-a-thousand-year events when you
get a month's rainfall in two days; it does not fall into the
normal probability prediction model. So something to help us have
a better understanding of mapping would be very much appreciated.
Thank you very much indeed, and thank you for your written evidence.
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