Agenda item

Report of the Head of Locality Services - Commissioned

Further to Minute No. 26 of 8 November 2016 the Committee considered the report of the Head of Locality Services – Commissioned seeking, in accordance with the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 (the Act), a review and scrutiny of the exercise by the Council as a Lead Local Flood Risk Authority of its flood risk management functions and coastal erosion risk management; and the submission of comments to the Cabinet Member - Locality Services.

The report indicated that Sefton’s Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Strategy (the Strategy) was a requirement under section 9 of the Act; that the Strategy was adopted by Cabinet on the 1 October 2015; that the Strategy set out how Sefton would deliver flood and coastal erosion risk management, what investment would be needed to deliver this and the manner in which this service would be delivered and defined the outcomes, outputs and actions for this service area; and that the Strategy was due to be updated in 2018 and work was currently underway to review the risk, update actions and review  outcomes to see if they were still relevant for the next strategy period.

The report also detailed flooding incidents that occurred in the Southport and Formby areas on 5 September 2017; work that had been developed to help deliver Sefton Council’s priorities to create resilient communities and outlined that projects aimed to support communities to become more resilient during flood events and to have an input in the decisions made about flood risk management; work undertaken with the Formby Flood Group, Maghull Flood Committee and Thornton Parish Council on flooding issues; staffing issues within the Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Team; the work undertaken as a statutory consultee for major planning applications and the provision of technical support and advice to the planning authority throughout the Local Plan inquiry; grant in aid has been secured from the Environment Agency to undertake investigations and studies into two watercourses that serve Southport and Birkdale (Nile and Pool Investigations); that £30k funding had been secured from Environment Agency to undertake the Merseyside Natural Flood Risk Management project; and regarding coastal risk management there had been no significant incidents of flooding or erosion along the coast.

The report also detailed partnership working with Merseyside Tactical and Strategic Flood Risk Partnership, North West and North Wales Coastal Group, Liverpool Bay Coastal Sub Group, Northern Coastal Sub Group, the Environment Agency and United Utilities.

The report concluded by setting out the priorities for 2018 relating to Supporting the Local Planning Authority, Community Engagement/SUDS Hubs, Crosby Coastal Schemes, Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Strategy Review, Securing Capital Funding, Natural Flood Risk Management, Performance management and the Green Infrastructure Service.

Members of the Committee asked questions/raised matters on the following issues:-

·       Planning conditions relating to flood risk/drainage attached to the approved residential development application at Damfield Lane

·       Concerns about the degradation of the River Alt Training bank at the northern end of Crosby beach and the potential increased risk of erosion to existing defences

·       Funding responsibility for the maintenance of the MEPAS rising main sewer that runs behind the coastline serving a large part of northern Crosby

·       Work to protect the frontage section between the Alt training bank and the coastguard station

·       Planning policy and awareness raising of the negative flood risk impacts of paving over gardens to create driveways

·       Funding difficulties associated with the Crosby coastal defences that run from the Hall Road car park south to Seaforth Docks

·       The use of the Corporate Communications Team to provide briefings, or messages via Instagram, for Members on flood risk management functions and coastal erosion risk management

·       The potential use of planning conditions to require the provision of sumps in new residential developments to aid with sustainable drainage 

·       Projections for coastal erosion at Formby Point

·       Enforcement issues and disputes between the developer and United Utilities in relation to the residential development at the Parkhaven site in Maghull

·       Concerns about developers using private building regulation companies of their choosing to sign of their works on site

·       Concerns about Section 189 of the National Planning Policy whereby local authorities cannot require that a developer engages with them before submitting a planning application, but they should encourage take-up of any pre-application services they do offer; and that they should also, where they think this would be beneficial, encourage any applicants who are not already required to do so by law to engage with the local community before submitting their applications.       

RESOLVED: That