Money earmarked for the Environment Agency (EA) under the draft Flood and Water Management Bill should be redirected to local authorities ‘where the work is going to get done’, according to London Councils.
In its response to the draft Bill, the umbrella organisation representing London’s boroughs said it was ‘clearly unacceptable’ that the Government had offered no guarantees for future spending, yet expected local authorities to make investments now.
‘London Councils would like to see a larger percentage of the funds available for flood-risk management going directly and explicitly to local authorities, which will now have the responsibility as well as the democratic accountability for local flood-risk management.’
Michael Ojo, London Councils’ head of environment, told Surveyor much of that funding should come from the EA, which ‘seems to be getting extra funding even though it has a small overview role’.
‘It’s is all very confused at the moment – there’s no need for so many people to be involved in the funding merry-go-round.’ He warned that under the current proposals, it was not possible for local authorities to fund their new responsibilities.
London Councils also said the draft Bill did not address the ‘serious funding and capacity gap’ in engineering skills. ‘There is no recognition of how we can work in the short term while we develop capacity long term,’ Ojo said.
Elsewhere, the Government’s estimates of how local authorities could cover the costs of taking responsibility for sustainable drainage systems (SUDS) ‘do not add up’, London Councils claims. Ojo also said the draft Bill’s definition of ‘flood’ excluded lots of types of sewer flooding, which affected much of the capital.
Proposals for cross-borough surface water management plans are set to be submitted to the Department for the Environment and Rural Affairs (Surveyor, 9 July 2009).
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