Future Flood and Water Management Legislation
Memorandum submitted by Devon County Council (
FFW 07
)
0
Executive Summary
0.1 Devon County Council (DCC) is LLFA for Devon (excluding Torbay and Plymouth) in a two tier local government arrangement. DCC seeks to bring to the attention of the EFRA Committee concerns
over
funding of the
F&WM Act
, SuDs
and the powers required to ensure suitable land management.
1.
General
1.1
Clarification is required over the difference between Flood Management Plans and Surface Water Management Plans (SWMP). At the draft bill stage reference was given towards SWMPs but now reference is given to Flood Management Plans for individual flood risk areas. Is one higher level or more detail than the other
?
How
are they intended to feed into each other?
1.2
DCC feels that the LLFA should have greater powers to ensure land management and riparian responsibilities are enforced along with powers of entry and recharge should any necessary works be carried out by a LLFA.
2.
Funding
2.1
The F&WM Act only places a responsibility on LLFAs for ‘Local Flood Risk’ which is defined as surface water, ground water and ordinary watercourses under Section 9(2) of the Act. Therefore it is difficult to see why
the disproportional split in the UK is weighted towards river and coastal
.
2.2
Whilst it is accepted that in some circumstances there can be an interaction between river and surface water flooding (e.g. swollen rivers preventing surface water from entering) current national funding for England is mainly directed towards the 2.4 Million people at risk of river and coastal flooding in flood zone 2 & 3, whilst there is no dedicated funding stream for the 2.1 Million people at high or moderate
risk of surface water flooding.
2.3
This leads on to a wider debate on whether the existing (significant) funding for river and coastal flood risk that the EA currently receives should be added to the new funding for surface water, ground water and ordinary watercourse flood risk to create a single total ‘Flood Risk Management’ Pot. This pot could then be distributed based upon both flood zone risk and surface water vulnerability. This would help to ensure better outcomes for the public as limited resources could be better directed to deal with the greater risk whether it is from river, coastal or surface water flooding
.
2.4 In comparing the figures for flood zone 2 & 3 to moderate & high surface water risk for
England
in the recent DEFRA consultation on funding shows that although £36M is being proposed for LLFA
s
it falls way short of the current £570M historically spent on river and coastal flooding per annum. With a 46%/54% split on different flood risk
responsibilities
it appears illogical to only propose to fund the new burden with 6% of the funding [subject to CSR 20 October].
2.5
Quote from the EA website "At the moment the Environment Agency, Local Authorities and Internal Drainage Boards are spending £570 million to build and maintain flood and coastal defences.
.
. We estimate that a further £150 million per year may be required to manage surface water flood risk by 2035."
2.6 Diagram showing data from recent DEFRA consultation compared to current funding proposals.
2.7
Typically maintaining an asset register is a massive undertaking for the authority, requiring the necessary investment to ensure the function is carried out correctly and the correct staff employed to fulfil the function.
We require clarification on the level of detail that is expected in the register of flood related assets. Previous asset experience within highways indicates that this w
ill
be a
n
enormous task with huge cost implications.
2.8 The LLFA is required to
deliver modelling,
produce plans
,
buy
software
&
surveying equipment and importantly
implement
physical measures on the ground. Clearly this
funding
is inadequate and will not deliver the benefits that the Pitt Review envisaged. More importantly it is not sufficient to deliver the meaningful action to reduce flood risk which the public is expecting through the implementation of the Act.
2.9
The
national funding proposal
appears to be a distribution of limited funding, rather than an effective analysis of how much it will actually cost each authority to implement the new burdens resulting from the Act. Perhaps it is envisaged that separate capital grants will be made available in the future for implementing capital works relating to managing surface water flood risk however no indication has been given to date from Defra that this will be the case - indeed verbally it has been suggested that this money will be the only source of funding.
3.0
SuDs
3.1
In the Act all SuDs serving more than one property will be adopted and maintained by the lead authority. We feel that this does not allow the LLFA to act in a strategic sense for adoption and maintenance, the threshold needs to be much higher.
3.2
The freestanding application process described allows SuDs to be adopted retrospectively;
we do not view this favourably
, as the LLFA may adopt SuDs where no construction inspection has been carried out, which could result in a major maintenance liability
and the
fact the SuDs may not perform satisfactorily
. This may result on official commencement many will apply to the LLFA to retrospectively adopt SuDs serving more than one property.
3.3
We have a concern that there is no mention
of commuted sums in the Act,
there is a lot of research on cost of SuDS m
aintenance in CIRIA C697 (2007).
This could be brought up to date and used to agree commuted sums with developers. However, it is not anticipated that a developer would agree to commuted sums for more than a 25 year maintenance period.
We do not believe that
DEFRA
accurate assessment of
the
full
cost of maintaining adopted SUDS.
3.4
We do not support the view that this will be funded by savings by the transfer of private sewers. In a two tier council arrangement the LLFA would receive no savings from such a transfer.
3.5
We do not believe that oversized sewers
,
underground attenuation
or
devices should be included within the definition of SUDS. These systems should be viewed as being part of the piped sewer network and should not require assessment and adoption by the SAB.
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