Suffolk County Council, Scrutiny Committee Meeting – 12 March 2024
Members of the Committee:
Michael Ladd
Sarah Adams
Edward Back
Stuart Bird
Nadia Cenci
Robert Everitt
Jessica Fleming
Joe Mason
James Reeder
Keith Scarff
Keith Welham
Nathan Wilson
E e all right good morning ladies and gentlemen it’s just uh 10 o’cl so welcome to the suff County Council scrutiny uh meeting this morning on uh Tuesday the 12th of March 2024 welcome everybody um i’ particularly like to welcome welcome uh councelor Adam Ray from itge bar counc
Um and we are expecting councelor alist mcro from B District Council although he’s not here at the moment but we are expecting him as well um these are two members of the flood risk management scrutiny subcommittee um which we will be discussing at item six this morning can I remind you that this
Meeting has being broadcast over the internet and the recording will be available online after the meeting members of the public can press May record film for photograph or broadcast this meeting when the public and press are not lawfully excluded and in line with the council’s published guidance
Please could you ensure that your it equipment or mobile phones are on silent or Switched Off please and can you speak clearly in the microphones and avoid placing papers and it equipment in front of them as it distorts the uh the recording we’re not expecting a fire
Drill today but in the event of the alarm sounding please leave the room following the far exit signs um that you can see okay my name is councelor Michael lad I’ll be chairing the meeting this morning uh and the first item on the agenda is uh public questions and we
Have uh three public questions this morning uh the first question is from councelor Julia art so councelor art would you like to come forward please and uh ask your question when you’re ready thank you very much chair with respect to residents of yoxford and kelel Ward impacted by flug
Babet and other subsequent weather events who were recipients of the current flood management process offered by suffk County Council then given the recommendations that the scrutiny committee are considering undertaking as suggested in the reasons for recommendation and the responsibility therein of the committee scrutinizing the work model of the processes applied
To Residents impacted by a flood emergency by suffk County Council flood committee then in order to ensure the process relating to the residents pre during and post flood experience is fit for purpose and current suffer County Council flood management committee or other named body commit to review and
Rework the model of the flood management process possibly using the experience of the residents impacted in beet in order that future residents can experience and importantly be aware of a more clear and responsive pathway being in place with suffer County Council in respect of a flood emergency thank
You thank you for your question councelor ER and uh yes it was unprecedented wasn’t it this the storms that we had last year uh and I’m certain this committee uh will review all of those processes uh so that we can learn for the future so I’m certain we will do
That uh just to ask members to bear that in mind do you have a supplementary comment or question I would UST that to you that you carry that out on beh of my thank you yes certainly thank you very much second question this morning is from uh Mr Philip Freeman representing
Friston I’ve said that correctly Paris Council I think uh Mr Freeman will correct me if that’s that’s wrong so Mr Freeman would you like to take your place please and when you’re ready ask your question my question is has suffk County Council a strategic plan to manage the increase
In flooding in Theron which is badly affecting Farmland the local environmentally sensitive area and potentially the river Wy which is caused by the developments on I Airfield which have resulted in a huge increase in impermeable surfaces and has led to this flooding thank you Mr Freeman for your
Question uh fortunately we have the environmental strategy manager here Matt Hollis I think he will try and answer your question for you thank you thank you Michael thank you um Mr Freeman hi um the simple answer to your question is no we don’t have a strategic sorry could
You I’m deaf so I am struggling with your hearing Loop if I could see your mouth that would help so apologies for that not a problem um so the simple answer is no we don’t have a strategic ma uh plan to manage surface water in the Theron area um
There is also we don’t have any direct evidence to link the the flooding that’s being experienced at the moment to development in I Airfield um and let me expand on that a little so since 2015 which was when the County Council had a actually responsibility to to uh um to
Be a consultee in the planning process there have been four planning applications on the um on our Airfield um none of those connect to the exist to the to the pre-existing outfalls that that take flood water away from the the Airfield and all of them um are have had
Sustainable drainage um put in place where the the runoff rate is restricted to Green Field runoff rate um rather than Brownfield runoff rate which would um be allowed in the planning process so we’ve made improvements to um to the runoff rate coming from that land um that has been developed and so for
Example Green Field runoff rate allows for 2 lers per second per hectare to be um to to come off the land the rest of the water is is stored until it can be released at that rate whereas Brownfield off rate can be up to 100 lers per
Hectare per second per hectare so you can see the difference that we’ve um we’ve tried to uh U make there by um using sustainable drainage techniques in in new development so that’s um that’s the link between the the recent development and ongoing development that may happen on that site in terms of what
We would do as a statutary consulty what would we we would um require to to be in place um um colleagues did go out and visit that this location and the surrounding parishes um recently um and it’s very clear that the ditch um network uh in in that area that does
Take some of the uh historic water from I Airfield as well as all the water that drains from the from the agricultural land um that ditch network isn’t in good a good state of repair so there are blockages there are unmaintained ditches there are ditches full of um uh
Vegetation there are CED sections that don’t look like they are transferring water so there there is potentially and also we’re dealing with unprecedented levels of rainfall since since October um which is means that there is standing water on on pretty much all agricultural land particularly on the on the clay
Clay land of high suffk so um the the the solution um to the current situation is is probably a combination of the riparian owners taking responsibility for maintaining their ditch Network um and making sure that any future development um as the most recent one has makes the problem less bad in terms
Of runoff coming from the uh the development on I on I Airfield thank you okay thank you Matt for that Mr Freeman have you a supplementary question Okay carry on uh I must point point out that although there’s been significant uh development on the Airfield suffk County Council has
Recently admitted that there have been only eight planning applications in 87 years of I’s existence dealing with drainage there has been no requirement and no effort made to assess the full overall drainage impacts of all developments on the Airfield to date the present frequent flooding has occurred
Even before the TR power station on the Airfield substation and synchronous condenser in yakle have been completed these must be considered as future contributories uh to the problem a recent planning application Mr Freeman I’m going to have to push you for a question is a but I’m just you need the
Context and this is quite important I will take one more minute a recent planning application for further Airfield development for fuel station and Lorry parking has been submitted with erroneous hydrological plans which show ditches which uh ditches exist where there are none water is expected to discharge uphill uphill I stress to
The river wavy incorrect assumptions on the volumes of water and the direction of flow Theron Parish Council has challenged these conditions and called for a site meeting with the relevant departments for over a year but without success we find no enthusiasm for this with the district or County Council to
Challenge the application thank you okay thank you so there wasn’t a question there was at the beginning was it okay and that was that was a long while ago we’re asking to assess the drainage impact on all developments so can you do that please which is not happening okay now
Whatever the gentleman from the environment uh Department says the flooding is happening the farm farmers are people who’ve been farming there for many years and they are recording an increase dramatic increase in the Dage you I think you’ve made your point Mr freem we’ll get a quick response if we
Can yep no problem so we do consider um uh all planning applications as a statutary consult so that um your allegations about water flowing up and all the rest of it will be investigated um the flooding situation and the investigation by suff County Council um has to meet strict criteria before we we
Undertake those investigations we’re we’re um the council is currently investing in a large amount of money in investigating the significant flooding from Storm barbet um Theron doesn’t meet those criteria because it it uh links to um internal property flooding and I’m sure you’d be um in agreement that we
Should focus on those people who have suffered internal property flooding first um and then work our way down that list and and we have locations where over 100 had internal flooding locations so and probably and 50 locations where more than five houses flooded internally so we will be focusing on doing the
Investigations in those locations thank you okay thank you for your question Mr Freeman the next question is uh uh from Mr Richard sheld representing henham flood resistance for the parish council uh Mr sheldrake is not present this morning so I will read his question could the council create an
Issue of repairing responsibilities and Loan land owner responsibility document similar similar to the sustainable drainage guides for use by Parish councils district councils and county councils in order to manage escalated requests for works and to help pre-mentioned land owners be aware of their rights responsibilities and requirements to create and maintain
Drainage so could you just give a response to that yeah I’m very pleased to say that since 2019 we’ve had one of those so um I’ve got a copy of it here um it’s available on our website and has been circulated to all Parish councils recent recently since storm babet and it
Details all all the points that that are made so thank you okay that’s great thank you very much and as Mr sheld Dr is not present there’ll be no supplementary question I’m moving on then to item two apologies for absence and substitution we did have apologies from councel Joe
Mason who was substituted by councel David gsmith who doesn’t appear to be here as yet so he may uh he may come later on uh and also at this stage I’d like to welcome councelor James reer who’s uh a permanent member of the scrutiny committee now replacing councelor roach who has uh apparently
Moved on to higher things but so welcome welcome James to the committee item three is Declarations of interest and dispensation are there any for to be declared thank you item four is the minutes of previous meetings we have two to uh confirm uh the 11th of December 23
Which was the carbon budget uh seems a long while ago now uh and the 11th of January 24 which is the financial budget are you happy that that’s a fair intervie record of those those meetings yes okay thank you I’ll sign those afterwards then so moving on now to item five the impact
Of water availability on suffk economy this is on page 29 of your papers uh just to read out the objective for this uh this scrutiny is uh to hear how the water is available to Residents and business use in suffk is sourced provided and regulated and consider the potential
Impact on suffix economy of geographical variations in its availability members will also consider this morning the impact on farmers of the ongoing review of abstraction licenses and discuss how the council can support the agricultural industry as it contributes to the drafting of the next strategic Water Resources review and I welcome all the
Witnesses here this morning I ask you to interview yourself uh uh shortly but thank you for giving up your time today we really do appreciate that it seems ironic that we’re talking about Water Resource on a day when it’s raining quite hard uh and as I drove here this
Morning to see all the water laying on the fields uh and on the mares uh we’ve had unprecedented rainfall I think in February uh and before that as well so it’s quite important that we actually have this discussion this morning to see what we can do uh not to prevent rain
Coming but actually to make better use of the rain uh when we when we get it for the dry months and I understand that suffer is the one of the dest counties uh so you wouldn’t believe that today would you but anyway I’m going to hand over I think councelor Richard Smith is
Going to uh uh introduce uh Richard is the cabinet member for economic development transport strategy waste and skills uh I think if if Richard can just do the intro uh then the others can introduce themselves and and do their their bits as they go if that’s okay
Over to you Richard chairman thank you very much and it’s uh a pleasure for me today to be in front of the scrutiny committee uh debating as we will be a very important topic you have taken uh the wind out of my sales chairman by um
You know almost making a joke that here we are talking about shortage of water when we’ve had nothing but water pouring down from the sky since storm babet in October but the uh longer term is problematical and that’s what we’re here to uh look at today now really councelor
Richard rout should be here in my place because he is the cabinet member for finance and the environment and this really falls into his area rather than mine uh although I have been briefed on this subject because of my Economic Development UH responsibilities and we’ll hear more about that especially
When we uh hear from the uh representative from babber and mid suuk uh councelor rout is on honeymoon at the moment he recently married and I don’t think we can begrudge him having a couple of weeks honeymoon uh and I’m happy to substitute for him I’m also
Happy and relieved that I have Matt hullis on my left who is an expert officer who has been under tremendous pressure he and his team since October uh there are now I think about 45 section 19 investigations pending this is under the act of parliament to look
At the deep ER reasons for flooding uh and indeed in the area that I represent I have four villagers who suffered quite severely from premises flooding and it is very upsetting when that happens and the consequences of those of that of that flooding is still being dealt with
And will take a considerable while to be dealt with properly so uh we are talking today about the scarcity of water not the glut of water and I’m delighted chairman that we have such a distinguished uh number of speakers here and in due course they will as you say introduce themselves uh
I will do my best to play uh answer questions which are put to me uh and I’ll deal with any political uh angles that there are uh but we really need to hear facts and figures and let’s start off with Matt hullis the environment strategy Mana manager here at suffer County
Council thank you Richard thank you chair um so yeah I’m not going to speak for very long I haven’t got any slides um so uh I just want to set the context I suppose and and um and maybe put a few questions in your mind about um what it
Is that we’re we’re looking at here firstly it’s an interesting challenge um for suffer County Council to scrutinize an issue that we don’t have any direct control over um um however obviously the the adequate of water supply um is absolutely critical to a thriving environment and economy um which is
Which are two things the council um has a very significant interest in so we we um we’re we’re scrutinizing something and the the the actions of others and um and how we can play a role um in ensuring that that that water is available um to um ensure the economy
And the environment are are are are um satisfied um the council does have a history though of recognizing this issue um and working with Partners to examine potential practical solutions to that um mainly from our lead local flood Authority role because we don’t have experts um in terms of water um Supply
But certainly we do have experts in terms of dealing with the with the flooding issue and we recognized early on since have since getting that those responsibilities back in 2010 um um that there is obviously a direct link it might seem like a um the best place in
The world if you don’t like hard work to be a flood risk manager in the driest County um in suffk um certainly that wasn’t the attraction of the job for me but um but the the other thing that you notice as a flood risk manager in um in
Suffk is that um we are dealing with a shortage of water it won’t be too long before you’re you’re talking to someone that wants more of it um and the flood risk responsibilities we have is about managing too much so there’s an obvious link there that we’ve recognized for
Some time um and we’ve taken steps and worked with Partners to look at how we can use our flood risk role um more effectively to provide some of that water we’ve got um projects ongoing so reclaim the rain is something that you um may have heard about if you haven’t
There’s a there’s an excellent website but that is a very that’s an innovation project funded by directly funded by national environment agency um colleagues working um across norol and suffk with case studies to examine how we can value flood water how we can extract the value of that stored water
Um keeping it away from the places where we don’t want it but making it available to people who may want it and that could be agriculture that could be an industrial use or it could be a community use or it could just be a purely environmental use but how do we
Um make the best of that flood water rather than treating it as a waste product and and and putting it um into and getting it away from the the place as fast as possible so reclaim the rain is one example um we also use our statutary consult te role um in terms of
Sustainable drainage Solutions on new development to think about how we can better use that water um that’s been um we’ve been doing that since 2015 as I mentioned earlier um and the the the opportunity to have multiple benefits of managing water in a slightly different way by keeping it above ground and
Keeping it on the the the development area for a longer period of um time and allowing it to um to move away um off that site on at a slower rate than it would if we didn’t do this um there’s lots of opportunities of of maximizing that benefit so the flood risk um
Reduction is one um holding that water above ground and creating environment enal benefit is another um aesthetically it’s often um an opportunity to make a development look nicer and create more green space but but the actual water There’s an opportunity there and that’s something that doesn’t get talked about
As much as it as it could do in my view um and so how we’ve started conversations with development especially some of the large commercial development on the edges of towns where you um you’re collecting an awful lot of water off large often large warehouses
And we could store that um and then just drain it back into the the existing drainage Network the ditches the rivers but is there somebody potentially a land owner adjacent to that site that would actually use that water for irrigation purposes um and so could we start cleaning that water as it falls
Making sure it’s in a good um in a good clean State um through natural processes through Suds management and then making that water available to a landowner um rather than just putting it into the natural system so there there’s a there’s a new um area that we’re we’re looking into and starting to
Explore more um and working with national colleagues to do that and then of course there’s felixo Hydro cycle which you may well have come across where we’ve um we we um we’ve basically turned the pipes round so instead of just pumping um waste water at the
Bottom end of a drainage system out into sea waterer where it gets mixed um and then doesn’t become usable we’ve effectively turned the pipes around um and we’re now pumping that water back Upstream so it provides all the environmental benefit that it when it flows down the the natural system and
Then at the end we can turn it around and pump it back up to that system and fill up Farm storage reservoirs to um to make it available for for further use that’s um uh uh that was a a pilot project that we delivered a couple of
Years ago um and is now being talked about um in the National plan for water it was used as an example of good practice in the National plan for water um and is there are ongoing discussions about repeats of that um uh across nor and
Suffk so um we are um we’re going to hear from the experts here with very specific responsibilities for um making sure that we’ve got enough water um going forward at a very strategic level um involving huge amounts of investment that’s required um but something um that
I think is worth thinking about in the back of our minds as we’re listening to everybody is that um what I I’ve understood over the last two or three years of being involved in this is that the public water supply so the water supply provided by the water companies
There are very detailed plans there’s lots of information lots of data um there’s a very clear clear um statutary framework for um making sure the investment is in place um and that we can provide the water that that is is being planned for and you’ll hear lots
More about that from from Daniel um but there are other water users who directly abstract water from groundwater from from um from uh surface water sources as well licensed by the environment agency which we’ll hear from as well um so these are agricultural users and Commercial and Industrial users that
Are very much more on an individual basis so they’re not it’s not organized in the way the water company is over a large area with lots of data they’re individual abstractors working um often in isolation um and they are going to be impacted by the future scarcity of water
As well as the water companies but they’re not as well organized and they haven’t got the collaboration and the data and everything behind them so um in terms of what we the role we can play as a council as a convener as a bringer together of different interests in order
To deliver that that environmental and economic benefit I talked about at the beginning that’s something that where we can play a role and maybe there’s an opportunity there for supporting these other users of water to to better um be able to um plan in the longer term for
Um how they’re going to use water how what investment is going to be required um and how are we going to ensure that that continued supply of water is going to be available or if it isn’t what what that means for our economy and for our environment so there’s just a question
There hanging for um for for um going forward thank you okay thank you very much um I think probably we could introduce ourselves uh as you as you go so I think Daniel your uh going to do the next bit is that correct yes that’s right so good morning
Everyone thank you thank you very much for inviting me to take part today’s security committee I’ve got some slides you want me to go through my slides now before introduce yeah so if I could have the first slide up on the screen I’m not sure quite how the
System there we go um so yes I’m Daniel Johns I’m managing director of Water Resources East and I thought I would spend just a minute or two introducing Water Resources East before talking about the regional Water Resources plan for the Eastern England that we published last December uh so w uh was
Set up originally in 2014 and then created a separate an independent uh not for-profit membership organization in 2019 uh we have a specific role under the national framework for Water Resources that’s the the government sponsored policy run by the environment agency um as one of five Regional planning groups covering the whole of
England and parts of uh of Wales are REM the coures for the east of England and therefore our members and board members are those organizations you see on our screen so we have the four water companies who operate in the East but we’ve also got the national Farmers
Union and the association of drainage authorities we’ve got representatives of the energy sector and we have environmental interests represented on the board our most recent members are Urban and Civic as a developer a master developer active in the East and the Oxford to Cambridge pan Regional partnership but Matt Hollis is our
Representative for suffk but we’ve also got Norfolk Essex Cambridge and the peterb combined Authority so we’ve got a a representative mix of different sectors on our board who also fund our core costs as a as a not for-profit organization we also have standard membership over 180 individual standard
Members who are formal members of w with full voting rights at our annual General meetings so we encourage kind of collaboration and we feel that our regional plan is a kind of is a collaborative effort to create the right answer for all different sectors to manage the scarce uh water and those
Water pressures so a mixture of agricultural businesses local councils environmental uh not uh non-government organizations uh consultants and others active in the Water Management space but to get on to the regional Water Resources plan for easn England this is a document that’s been long in production we published a draft in November
20122 and following consultation we updated our plan and published it as Final in December just before just before Christmas what it tells is quite a St picture not just of the current water scarcity pressures but the direction of travel should we not take any additional action to to address them
First of all as already has been mentioned the east of England is the driest part of the country it receives only about 2third of average National rainfall uh and climate change is going to make that those pressures worse you climate change will exacerbate the rainwater cycle making rain water
Heavier when it falls but also extending and increasing the probability of dry weather and drought and what that does is creates a kind of if we do nothing we end up up on the left hand side of this chart where we have quite significant shortfalls in water for supplies both to
Households and businesses overall about 800 million liters of water per day by 2050 and that’s about a quarter of current daily use at present and what that means is it well it’s also not a kind of a future problem these constraints on water scarcity impacting constraints on growth are already
Starting to emerge around the east of England we talk about Norfolk in terms of agriculture suffer also in terms of Agriculture and the moratorium are new non-household Connections In the harir Zone as mentioned in your background paper and of course we’re very active in and around Cambridge uh with the policy
Statement from government last week addressing the water scarcity pressures which have led to several planning applications being placed on hold and lots of pressure now to save water and to use water much more efficiently what our regional plan does is it takes the current situation and plans forward to
2050 and Beyond to try to find the best value way of managing through those decades to find uh more water and to use more water efficient uh use the available water more efficiently so that we can meet the needs of both households and uh business customers and uh also
For agriculture and and the environment and what we try to do overall is meet the growth projections being brought forward by local authorities we have also been told by government to increase the level of drought resilience within the public water supply by 2040 uh so kind of stand pipes and those
Severe drought restrictions become a thing of the past and also to plan for the highest environmental ambition so our plan primarily is actually being driven by the environmental needs of water bodies to return them to good ecological status given at present only 8% of rivers across the east of England
Are in a healthy you know semi-natural State um just I’ve seen that your slides my slides are actually in front of you Al so I won’t go through the detail of these slides but essentially the overall picture is that demand across different sectors is increasing we’ve got a growing population we’ve got investment
Coming into the county and across the region for new non-household water supplies agriculture of course is a really significant user of water particularly during those spring and summer months that irrigation season and we expect uh water needs for for agriculture to increase we also expect water needs for for energy to increase
Too so whilst in the past we had lots of water being used to cool fossil fuel power stations they you know they they’ve thankfully gone um but what we will have is new green hydrogen production popping up in parts of the East and that’s already starting to
Happen in places like Phoenix though for example low St uh backton up in Norfolk and that’s a very water intensive process obviously green hydrogen is produced through electrolysis of freshwat but that’s also quite uncertain it’s very difficult to know exactly where and when these green hydrogen production facilities will pop up and
Therefore it’s quite difficult for us as a regional Planning Group and as water companies to plan for the green hydrogen needs for the future future economy um so demand is going up but the water available to supply is going down uh it’s already been going down because of
The need to restore uh water bodies to a more natural state uh initially to stop waterers get water bodies getting any worse so there’s a requirement through the environment agency to prevent any further deterioration to water bodies under the water framework directive or we’ve retained that water framework
Legislation under the uh under the kind of the withdrawal act um we also as I said need to improve drought resilience for the public water supply by 2040 that means we need to find more water to be able to deal with those deep drought events climate change is already
Impacting the water cycle and will progressively make things worse and worse uh and finally by the time it gets 2040 2050 we’ve been told by government to try and restore all water bodies to that more natural state to restore river flows to stop chalk streams drying out to protect the sensitive ecological
Habitats like the norol and suff broads and so part of the plan actually the biggest part of the plan as I say is trying to step back abstraction from places where it is unsustainable uh to license uh to cap licenses where where necessary uh through the environment agency’s processes to to restore water
Bodies as far as possible toward that good ecological health and what that means across the region is quite a you know it does differ in terms of the level of impact you can expect on individual abstraction licenses uh depending on where you are within the region and these charts show try to show
You first fall across the top for the public water supply might what might happen for licenses and then what might happen for licenses for agriculture across the bottom on the left hand side you’ve got the kind of least ambitious environmental uh scenario on the right hand side you’ve got the most ambitious
Environmental scenario so as you can see both for public water supply and for agriculture by the 2040s by the 2050s we’re expecting quite deep reductions in the license levels license volumes for existing uh existing extraction licenses as much as kind of 40 50 if not 60% or
More in some cases and actually for suffk as part of a project that W worked on with the environment agency and the rivers trust uh this is the W of Tomorrow project there’s a link there to these these these Maps uh for East suffk for the East suffk catchments there was
More detailed modeling done for individual licenses looking to see to what extent those license volumes will need to be reduced um in order to bring water bodies back into good health and even before you take into account uh climate change so just to highlight one particular example bottom right you got
The river river gipping um where there’s quite significant abstraction both for the public water supply and for agriculture we need to reduce those license volumes by almost the license volumes by about 90% I believe the figure is uh so reducing current levels of groundw abstraction by 89% and license volumes by
93% and that’s one of the things so if you look at averages averages hide what actually might happen within individual places so these Maps produced by the environment agency with partners are really a really important indication let’s say of what might happen to agricultural water users within within
Suffk and the answer as Matt has said there are answers out there investment in winter storage reservoirs investment in schemes like the phide hydro cycle about making better water use of the water within the catchment also more water efficient means to irrigate crops and also different crop types that are
More drought tolerant uh less water Reliant so what that means back to the public water supply is uh an emerging and quite significant deficit in the amount of water available for households and for for commercial businesses and and Industry so the Blue Line shows the demand for water going up and the orange
Line is the amount of water overtime that’s available to supply creating by the time he gets 2050 an 800 million liter per day deficit as I mentioned at the beginning we we think with water companies we can address almost half of that deficit through demand side action through uh using more water more
Efficiently tackling leakage you’re moving water companies even beyond the industry leading position where they are right now helping households use uh use less water by fitting more um water efficienc water efficient appliances that are coming onto the market uh and also things like labeling Taps toilets showers for the most water efficient
Which will start to happen from next year but we will need more investment in new sources of Supply sustainable sources of water supplies in order to meet the remaining deficits and what that means within the region uh you the the the left hand side side shows you
How the kind of stacks of water uh sources uh build up over time um we’ve got a A Time slice here for 2030 just to illustrate the kinds of options that hopefully will appear by the end of the decade and exactly where those options reside within the region on on the right
Hand side and you can see first of all by 2030 we’ll have that dotted green line that bring that Bridges and kind of uh connects up all the individual Water Resource zones through the region that’s anglian water strategic pipeline that’s being built today will be in place by
2025 or thereabouts and that’s a really important kind of backbone to the Future Water Resources Network within the region because not only does that allow you to move water from Water Resource Zone to Water Resource Zone but it also allows these new water supply options that are being brought onstream to
Conect Connect into that wider network but by 2030 we’re also expecting um the the first reuse schemes this is e treated effent reuse at at lowestoft an upgraded water uh water treatment works at at Lyford as well and smaller kind of transfer schemes and supply side options
But really the thing start to kicking from about the mid 2030s by by 2036 we hope we’ll have the first of two strategic new reservoirs within the east of England the first at uh just outside chassis in the Cambridge defens will supply both angland water and Cambridge
Water to meet the growth the quite significant growth that’s happening in and around Cambridge and also help deliver both better drought resilience and environmental Improvement and you will also have by 2040 that second strategic res Reservoir option uh just further north outside sleaford in South Lincolnshire together potentially with
Three desalination plants that we think we will need by the 2040s to meet the remaining uh Supply demand deficit and the three locations that be identified as Mabel Thorp bton and Holland and sea there was also potential option at Felix that didn’t make it into a COR pathway
But there is option around a diesel plant at Felix as well uh so that’s the overall Regional plan it’s a regional plan that’s that’s takes account of the growing demand for water it takes account of the environmental needs for water uh and that reduction abstraction license volumes that will need to take
Place it takes a kind of 5 y a 5early Time step through to 2050 to explain what needs to happen by when in order to keep the plan on track it delivers greater drout resilience for the public water supply and importantly for the environment it it hands a huge amount of
Water back to the environment there’s much much needed by say sensitive Wetland habitats by chalk streams and rivers across the east of England so that Water Resources should no longer be a constraint on the health of ecology and and and of nature uh so thank you very much for the invitation to speak
This morning and look forward to the discussion right thank you very much um one of the other important agencies of course is the environment agency and we have two Representatives here this morning we have Gran verer and who Richards so would you’d like to introduce yourself and then uh go from
There yeah morning everyone so I’m gr Veria the interim area director and I’m joined by Hugh I apologies my colleague Paul was coming from our national teams to support from us sort of policy but unfortunately he’s unwell today so uh me and Hugh do our best to answer any of
Those questions as we can um I was just going to cover sort of three main points and I’ll try not to duplicate what what’s already been said um talk a little bit about our role in in licensing uh some of the changes that are a foot and also how we work with
Others but also um our role as as a regulator as well in that we we have to to wear both hats sometimes um so around how we we uh license some abstractions so part of our role is to make sure for across England that um there is enough
Water for people and that is uh some of what’s been alluded to already around public water supply industry and importantly agriculture but also for a healthy environment that that’s sort of part of our our wider role so through our permitting system we control how much water can be taken and this
Includes taken from surface water so such as rivers lakes and estries but also from uh from underground uh from the AC um it doesn’t include the sea and open Coast areas and it doesn’t include discrete water bodies so water bodies aren’t connected to surface water or groundwater uh supplies um uh
Abstraction licenses are needed if you are intending to take water from the environment of more than 20 cubic meters per day um and but there are some exemptions if uh needed for say fire fire Services things like that so there are a few few exemptions to our licenses
Um so we regulate existing licenses but also the uh Grant new ones um and um to do this we use catchman abstraction management um processes and that’s sort of a standard approach to assessing the amount of water that there there is available um and then also we use abstraction license strategies which
Look at more of a catchment level and uh give us more more local information on water availability based on those environmental needs um it’s important um well one really important part of licenses is is there and we’ve mentioned about protecting the environment but it’s also to make sure that one
Abstraction isn’t having a KnockOn effect to another so someone isn’t taking all the water Upstream that maybe is needed Downstream protection of the environment that’s really important um and and our assessment in simple terms is about the amount of water that must be present in the environment before
Abstraction can take place and then we conditionalize with hands off flows as well so they can be making sure we protect those sort of minimum levels that are required within the environment um just a little overview of some of the the stats there are approximately 20,000 licenses in England
And they authorize abstraction by water companies energy companies Farmers Growers as as as has already been covered um in East suffer cologne there are 353 licenses and and just just to give you an example public water supply makes up about 57% of those agriculture 25% and then you get down into industry 177%
Of the the available water and then there’s a small 1% for imunity and environmental purposes so just going to cover a little bit about how things might be changing so there was a water abstraction plan in 2017 and this looked at Water abstraction management uh and the reform
That’s needed over the the the sort of last few years and going into the future and how we’ll protect the environment and improve access to water and then it links to the river Bas and management plans which we’ve touched on so that was looking how do we address unsustainable
Abstraction how do we develop a stronger catchment focus and also modernizing some of our regulation you know we still do have some things that are paper based and we need to to modernize that um the environment act in 2021 from 2028 it says that the a would be allowed to
Amend damaging uh abstraction licenses and that is quite a significant change um whereas currently we can only alter time limited licenses Which is less than half of the licenses and water company licenses so there’s a significant change coming there um this would mean we’d now be able to undertake catchment wide
Reviews uh look at abstraction in in a much more broad sustainable way and when necessary make changes to abstraction licenses uh at the same time across the catchman um it’s another important thing I just wanted to make a point around was um although there’s no legal obligation
To do so we aim to give abstractors six years notice and that’s really important if we’re going to change their licenses to give them time to adapt their businesses I’ve been out meeting uh recently and in in previously with with farmers who have said look we need time
If our uh license is going to reduce we need time to build a reservoir and to get through all the planning that’s required so where we can we will give uh six years um there is a slight caveat with that sometimes there are we’re legally mandated to make changes more
Quickly so uh there are some instances and we’re seeing that play out in in Norfolk at the moment where we’re having to go quicker and that that is difficult for those people who need to adapt um so um uh specifically in suffk in 2026 there’s going to be a time limited
License renewals and if we’ve already capped licenses back in 2018 then we’re going to give an additional six years for those those reviews to take place um and we want to get to a sustainable catchment by 20135 um and they will uh those catchment reviews will include consultations with stakeholders and
We’ve got uh the Water abstraction groups the nfu and others are absolutely key to that and looking at those options to address sustainable abstractions and and some of those have been been talked through um I talked about modernizing our our Licensing Service so um we need
To move to a a digital platform and this year we’ve introduced e alerts for sensation uh sensation notices so this is where we are telling people when there is sufficient water to abstract or when there is insufficient water and they need to stop so that is something
That we’re now doing uh via an email much quicker than sending letters about so trying again to to be a bit quicker and more responsive to help those who who have got these licenses um so the last part um uh just a little bit about how how we work with
Others and how we regulate so uh I think we’ve got some really positive relationships with some of the water abstraction groups uh especially in East suffk and broadland they seem to be very proactive and that that’s really helpful for us uh we meet on a regular basis to
Share what the direction is of the environment agency and how we’re working but also to listen to what issues they’re coming up against and how then we can refer that back to our our policy and how we can adapt our our policy and processes as well um we provide proposals uh sorry prospects
For irrigation so we communicate to Growers uh what the likely scenarios might be for rainfall so what’s been happening over the last one three six months and and then to give them potential impacts that that might have on their growing season so again trying to get in advance to give people as much
Time as they can to prepare for what’s coming in the year ahead um we also uh sometimes need to use six um section 57 restrictions so that is where in the the heart of of summer when it’s the driest and hottest we might actually have to stop people from abstracting um we’ve
Had to use those twice in the last five years it’s not something we want to do but again through discussions with uh irrigators we try and talk to them and they’re very good at working with us to have voluntary so they voluntarily reduce their abstractions by 50% to try
And take a bit less but prolong what they can use so hopefully you can see that that working together with them to try and really help them because at the end of day they’re running a business they’re providing food for the country so it’s trying to work with them as
Closely as we can whilst protecting the environment as well um there is as as I think we’ve already alluded to in some of the other discussions we do need to look at moving though to a more sustainable abstraction directly taking that water in the middle of summer can be very damaging how can
We find ways of taking that water when it’s plentiful storing it which is another big challenge so it’s then uh available for use at the right time um we also have a new regulatory position statement so that is where we’ve worked say actually in times of flood while
There is a lot of water in the rivers allowing people with a license to take that water and a bit more water uh within some confines so that they can use that to to get themselves ready for the summer ahead um that that is not an alternative for having a license you
Still need a license but there’s way we’re trying to be a bit more flexible in our regulation where we can um I’ve already touched on the need for sufficient water but the the last couple of points uh defra has a a plan for water it aims to increase the stored
Water and reservoirs especially for agriculture by 66% uh to 2050 and there’s been two grants each with a fund of around 10 million that’s been released and the first round was opened up in November 2021 and the second round uh later this year and we’re waiting for
For reports of the what the third Grant might be and we’re also implementing a 2 million pound program to help improve water resilience for agriculture and that includes um water resource planning uh studies establishment of new water abstraction groups and also assessment of what local resource options there are
And I I think we’ve already touched these but you know what storage areas water rights trading rainfall harvesting and you’ve already heard some great stuff that’s going on in suffk so how can we do that um you know more and working with um uh those who need to use
The water so I think if that’s okay I’ll leave that there okay brilliant thank you very much um obviously uh suffk is a very high agricultural area and we’re very pleased today to have uh uh Charles hrth here from the national Farmers Union uh to give us a view of from the farmer
Side so over to you Charles thank you very much and thank you for the opportunity to uh speak with you to date just to introduce myself um so I’m Charles hes I’m the policy manager with the nfu so as part of that Ro I managed the uh Regional team of environment
Advisers uh covering the E Eastern patch um and before that I was actually uh farming South Kure on a highly productive uh agricultural uh Farm of which um we have some contract farming Arrangements in the Debon so uh many a happy day farming uh over in East suffk um suffk is highly productive
Agricultural land it may come as no surprise to you um there’s some very large Horticultural businesses producing an awful lot of food um and very heavily reliant on water and many of those businesses are feeling the effects of climate change in the past uh to use
Potatoes an example we used to be able to grow non-irrigated potatoes in suffk and get a relatively modest yield for the um the amount of input and time spent growing those now there are very very few businesses across the whole East anglian patch because of the
Increased um pressures on um on on water and um longer drier hotter Summers um growing such crops um and during the the sort of months of June to August that’s when agriculture uses two-thirds of its water and without water during those particular months the impact on size
Shape uh crop yield can come be massive for those businesses so um they are very very heavily reliant on water and without it um it’s it’s it’s unsustainable uh many of those businesses are facing a number of pressures and challenges at the moment um which are outside of what we’re
Talking about today but things like access to labor um supply chain fairness and input price volatility so whilst um we as we’ve already heard about we know the um expected uh demand is going to increase in agriculture that’s not being driven by expansion of businesses and increased cropping and indeed at the
Moment we’re actually seeing agricultural businesses in the horiculture sector contract which which is a real shame because of some of those pressures I just talked about um but we are seeing longer dry dry Summers um during the the most recent drought period of 2022 an awful lot of businesses um suffered great losses
Because of things like hands-off flow restrictions and also actually because of the temperatures as well um had a massive impact uh on on these businesses um but in terms of sort of how I suppose how how how things are changing um we’re seeing um a shift towards um the of the
Importance of winter fill reservoirs which does feel like the real kind of um solution for for for agriculture in many ways um because as you can see outside the moment there’s a lot of fields that don’t usually have ducks in them and we if we could store that water and use it
During the summer when during those Peak periods that that that would be the solution um but there are of course a lot of challenges around um around building reservoirs um it can take I think best case scenario probably three years to get a reservoir from concept to
Actually filling that thing um and they are very very expensive and for a lot of farm businesses at the moment they’re not uh flush with money because of some of the challenges I’ve just talked about um and they they can be looking at well over a million pound type Investments to
To secure the long-term future and the solution I suppose is um collaborative working with neighboring Farmers to look at pulling resources together to look at what’s called local resource options um which is which is something that gets talked about a lot at the moment um and we know that the the government is
Picking up on the importance of this through the the liks of the Water Management grants just just talked about um and also through um some of the some of the other work happening at more National level such as uh the government food strategy which came out a year or
Two ago which was Henry dimbleby LED on um which talked about the need to protect and grow the the Horticulture sector and in the Horticulture sector we are we are net importers not not across all lines but but broadly speaking we have quite an opportunity in the
Horticulture sector and we have quite an opportunity in suffk where we have many of these businesses we already have the right supply chain set up theyve got all the equipment the kit you know they could be doing more but they’re being hampered by by a a number of factors at
The moment and there’s a lot of work they are doing to try and use water more efficiently some some of which we’ve heard about already but particularly looking at um equipment such as um boom and tricular type systems moving away from those big rain cannons where there’s quite High evaporation rates um
But again these you know they take a lot of investment and a lot of a lot of um a lot of uh Ford planning and at the moment there’s quite a nervousness within the Horticulture sector about big scale investment into into their businesses um so I think any sort of
Confidence which can be can be instilled that um you know um that the water will be continue to be available for these businesses is really uh key um so in term I suppose what what what we can do one of the one of the big things we hear
About from Farmers when they’re Cons considering um the the future of their Water Resource resilience is is around building Winfield reservoirs and one of the issues they um often site is uh not just the costs but the challenges of actually getting planning permission so um the the planning process can can can
Take take a long time um but I suppose what weird like is just um you know real recognition of the importance of food security domestic food production and the uh important role wrong if you look at maso’s hierarchy of needs for example does food water and shelter is one of
The is one of the three things people need to survive um so we really like um you know some some good recognition of the importance of um of food security when when sort of planning decisions are being made around around uh reservoirs because they do um not only um create
Public good in the form of food which we all which we all need um but they can you know also give excellent biodiversity benefits in in the local area for um from birds and wildlife and all sorts and um in terms of sort of um being able to support members um um and
Farmers on on the ground with this uh there is uh eswag who already been mentioned which a very professionally well established run uh water abstractor group locally um and some work through the likes of the water food group to look at the establishment of more water abstractor groups so the more on the
Ground planning can be looked at for things like uh drought management plans and Water Resource Management plans so farmers can um can be best prepared as possible but we know they’re going to come under a pressure um to um to reduce reduce the amount of taking particularly from like surface water and groundwater
Type uh type access um and uh they are getting um you know noce as best they can from the EA to try to try and adapt to those changes but for for many of those businesses we don’t have an awful lot of uh resource uh to to hand um it’s
It’s quite a concerning picture where they’re going to be able to continue to uh access the water from as we get hotter and drier Summers um so I might leave there right because a few things I was going to mention did already get picked up but uh yeah thank you very
Much yeah that’s great thank you Charles I’m sure there’ll be some questions for you when we get to that stage so um we we were expecting I think uh um the chief planning officer I think who has arrived from uh uh Babor in mid suffk Philip isbel um Philip couldn’t be
Here till 11 so I think you’re dead on time actually it’s a it’s pretty good from that point of view so if you can just give us a little bit of a introduction uh when you’re settled and thank you for coming this morning just press the one on the right I
Think good morning uh Philip Isbell I’m Chief planning officer for babber and mids District Council now I did uh pull together a little bit of a PowerPoint presentation just to talk you through some of the issues that um bab mid suffk have seen of late um and I’ve never actually used this particular
Um SL operator but presuming this works so um just as general context bber mid suffk um has now got an adopted joint local plan um and just for for very broad context uh the headline policy in this strategically is is uh is sp8 which talks about amongst other
Things water infrastructure as a uh a particular point of interest um uh that’s kind of uh very headlined and an item D talks about provision of essential uh water supply and water recycling uh infrastructure in relation to the heart of mere um Water Resource Zone uh the supporting text of this
Policy SPO it is uh is particularly focused on that and uh uh that’s a particular point that um we’ve considered to be important enough to Warrant policy on um we’ve got specific policies and I know your focus this morning is on the economy but just for completeness help 23 relates to
Sustainable conru Construction and design uh and in its own right includes um policy elements around uh uh water efficiency in in buildings but typically that for residential development reflects um uh building regulations uh aspects uh and uh other our other policy in the joint local plan LP 26 uh
Particularly refers to water resources and uh water infrastructure and um encourages uh development which conforms to the principle of holistic Water Management so that’s for all Development Across the whole of uh bber and uh mids suffk as uh as two districts if I give you two uh working
Examples that we’ve had as cases in the heart as mere Water Resource Zone because that I think is where we’ve seen the most issue uh there was an application uh that we had in Shingle Hill in denim uh it’s an application for industrial building uh and uh for for
Two reasons uh we have subsequently refused that one of those reasons is to do with our sustainability of employment location so nothing to do with water um but the second reason uh followed on from uh our review of the water issue uh and associated with that we had advice
From Essex and suff water and this is an extract from it which uh effectively summarized that uh there was uh an issue for uh water supply for non-domestic purposes within uh the heartest M Water Resources Zone uh and uh their recommendation to us was that uh an appropriate and it’s technically called
A grampian condition would be a solution now uh our perspective in relation to this application uh was that we could not be confident that a condition such as that could actually be complied with uh and on that basis uh we refused uh permission that application is currently
Subject of an appeal uh and we are defending both the uh General employment Point uh uh given the location of this in the countryside uh of the district and the water supply Point uh given that the site of the application is quite Limited in scope and nature and the
Ability to actually ensure that there is uh sustainability of water supply I think is from our point of view not on balance um been demonstrated so that’s that’s a a speculative General employment proposal uh and and uh uh from our point of view this was uh prior
To the adoption of the joint local plan so the policies referred to are not quite those which are uh in in the joint local plan given its its its age uh and we’ll see with interest what the inspector does with that at appeal second case I wanted to talk to you this
Morning about was uh a place called fennings Farm in stradbrook uh as an application from poultry building uh poultry buildings and uh this fully engaged with the question of um water supply and that became the subject of much debate and discussion with the applicants through the life of the
Application uh and this was presented and reported to our planning committee uh for consideration with quite a lot of views being expressed on on all sorts of uh planning issues the upshot of that is that we uh reached a point where again ess6 and suffk water recommended a Gran
Condition and we felt confident that on the information available to us from the applicants there was the potential of uh delivering uh a sustainable water solution uh to supply uh the these buildings which did not rely upon um uh piped water supply from the mains uh and to underpin this we impose two
Conditions one around phasing of delivery of that uh alternative Supply H and the second one about the technicalities of the supply uh as uh expected to be delivered so that we had confidence that what was proposed in the application was part of the build as delivered on the ground those conditions
I recall have now subsequently been uh discharged I think it’s fair to say this was a novel issue both for the planning Authority and for uh the uh the applicant to deal with um who who does have considerable experience in the poultry sector um a and from our point
Of view I think um the provision of U both uh rainwater recycling uh and capture and uh use of a uh a um on Farm Reservoir gave us confidence that there would be uh a water supply which would not uh unduly impact upon the um Supply
That the heart of M Water Resource Zone uh has and and that broadly is is what I I wanted to draw your attention to as as experiences we’ve had in practicality the um policies that the district have have not seen a huge number of uh employment application come
Forward across um the uh the heartest mere Water Resources Zone recently but I think almost everybody is aware within the industry that uh water supply for non-domestic purposes is an issue and in Practical terms the commercial side of this is slightly interesting because in planning terms even if we do Grant
Planning permission uh it seems foreseeable that um uh the uh operator or Constructor of a devel of a development will not necessarily be able to secure the water supply anyway so that’s a commercial point Thank you right thank you very much very interesting that Water Resource is
Starting to have an impact on uh on planning applications which is I think very interesting to us all right thank you very much uh I think guys we we’ve got all the uh experts here um I just want to introduce obviously I think you all know councelor Steve WS on the end
Here Steve GE introduce your just your role I think you’re here for item six instead of Paul West aren’t you really is that yes thank you chairman and good morning to everyone um normally councelor West would be sat here um I have a very very small part of his
Portfolio um and that is to look after as best as possible the um 1,400 140,000 little drainage assets that are dotted over our 4 and a half thousand miles of Roads um it has got a link with the next item with sustainable drainage and the link
Is the uh the assets were never ever made to be able to deal with with water run off from fields and and um Rivers leaving their beds so we will be looking at sustainable drainage as a part to try and help that thank you for letting me
Be here okay thank you and just for you to finally before we open this question questions can I just welcome councelor Alon mcro who’s now joined us I think yes thank you from B District Council who’s another member of the flood risk management subcommittee so welcome okay
Ladies and gentlemen uh two or three hands went up pretty quickly I’ve got a councelor cheny first and then councelor Fleming and then counselor Everett thank you um I’ve got lots but I’m only going to ask one and let others because I think they might cover the same things
Um this to me has been the most important important item on the scrutiny agenda and the most interesting actually I’ve learned so much and that leads me on to observations I think we wrap too many things up in climate change and people switch off because they hear about it
Daily about everything whereas I think this should be a standalone um subject that is talked about and what I don’t see because I’ve learned so much in the workshop I was horrified by what the shortages could be now us as counselors if we don’t know all this until we’ve had a workshop what
Could the public possibly know and interestingly earlier on it it’s not insubstantial the domestic usage what I don’t see is one clear message so if we take recycling of plastics how well that worked where we where we did nothing I remember doing nothing everything went
In one bin and now we’re pretty good at recycling and I think people waste water I don’t think they realize what impact that has I think businesses waste water I’ve asked a few business people and a few um just Housewives and people that I know they have no idea about this this
Concern which I think is a a massive concern so I would like to know where all the partners come together where this one message very clear about water is going to be explained publicized alongside saving water businesses doing the same thing now I know farmers do this very well that came out very
Clearly in a workshop that we had a little while ago so they’re there already but I do think there are other business that are not there certainly domestic use I know people who just throw a few things into a dishwasher and then turn it on you know this is uh this
Needs to be addressed I feel as part and parcel of the shortages um I don’t think I’ve got anything else to add to that but it would be interesting to see and hear how you I I might be wrong there might be this one clear message from all
Of you um that will help this agenda that there may not be I don’t know who needs to answer that well I I I think we’ll soon find out yes Daniel yes I can have a go answering so uh each water company will have communications campaigns particularly
During the kind of spring and summer months to try and encourage households and business customers to use less water it tends to be at that time of year about one of water in the garden there’s a lot of outdoor water use and uh obviously hose pipes jet washers use
Huge amount of water when you can be watering plants particularly if if they’re planted in the ground rather than containers using kind of uh recycled water from the home and using kind of watering cans rather than kind of Hose pipes but I think there is a role for councils which we talked about
At an east of England uh local government Association water Summit that took place just last week so Matt was there I was there Hugh was there as well the NF was represented to because I think it is it does need to be a combination of messaging kind of aligned
Between councils and water companies potentially backed by the enir agency and government to tell uh to tell kind of the general public about how much water they use because the the stats are these that in on average um per person we all use about 135 lers per person per
Day when you ask people how much they think they use they’ll say about 40 liters per person per day and overall by 2050 the government’s goal is to get to 110 so there’s a massive disparity at the moment between what people think they use and what they actually use and
The big culprits are showers uh toilets and I say watering the garden and I did happen to check downstairs and of the three cubicles in the gents toilets behind reception uh I could only check two of the three cubicles and both those two cubicles were leaking and one of the biggest
Culprits for water wastage is leaking Jewel flush toilets about 10% of toilets across the country are found to leak and when they do leak they waste about 400 liters per person today per per day so it’s like having an equivalent of two or three extra people in your home because
People just aren’t checking their toilet so if there’s one message go home today check your toilet see if they’re leaking because it’s a really cheap and easy effect for a plumber to come in and they’ll do it within minutes y thank you that’s really interesting my husband’s a plumber actually and he
Probably would leave vals last before anybody before anybody else is um leakage is another one I know temps water have developed an app haven’t they where by people can report um leakages I’m not quite sure where and how but but if they’ve got an app is that across the board should
Other should we have an app well so every water company will have a means by which customers can notify them of leaks uh so S and S water obviously Supply most of the region plus also angul water uh as well uh say in in general both water companies are toward
The frontier in terms of leakage performance but both have committed to do much more as part of our regional Water Resources plan but certainly um leaks in the streets absolutely phone up your water company to tell them about it as soon as as possible but actually
About a quarter to a third of leakage happens within the home which takes us back to my previous point about leaking toilets get home check your toilets and get them fixed as soon as you can because uh they will be adding to your bill if you’re on a me a tariff a
Leaking toilet adds to your bill it be quite it can be quite significant okay thank you Matt just to add a couple of little details so our recent experience of using the angling water reporting process a leak appeared outside my house on the street um huge impressed it’s the first time I’d ever
Actually used it I’d heard about it hugely impressed in terms of the the speed reaction and the amount of communication they’re sort of telling me when they’ve booked the people to come when they’re going to come what they did cut when they dug the hole and fixed the
Leak they did cut off my internet but apart from that I’ve got great experience um and um and so that was fixed within a week I think um all completely done and sorted um the other point that Daniel makes about the fixers that that um I’ve learned more
About since being invol with water resources East is the is the implementation of Smart Water Smart Meters so like we have Smart Meters for or lots of people have Smart Meters for electricity now that the intention is that we will all have water smart meters and the massive Advantage there is the
Technology will pick up when your toilet’s leaking so the water company May phone you up and say did you know your toilet’s leaking because they can watch in the middle of the night that there’s water going through your water meter when there shouldn’t be and then
They’ll be able to pick up the fact that your water’s so so that technology can help us in solving these problems too okay Richard can I just come in and address the political side of your comments there because I absolutely agree with you we have had some incredibly useful information today and
I have learned a great deal and I think there are I count there are 14 County councilors in this chamber at the moment but there’s 75 of us and we all need to understand uh this message that you’re putting across so I’m very happy to pledge today that I will make sure that
This subject is taken to a conservative group meeting where all of our members are briefed and I will talk to opposition colleagues and both uh leaders of the opposition parties are here because I hope they will do the same because I really think if at least 75 Community Representatives understand
The seriousness of what we’ve heard and the need for action over the next 10 15 20 years that that is the right thing and that is a small start and not only hearing that is also very good to have heard the point of view from agriculture which I think is very important so
That’s a small pledge chairman but very happy to do that yeah great thank you very much for that I think sometimes it’s about winning hearts and Minds isn’t it and it’s a it’s a different concept I think for people concerned about water uh um my habits certainly changed when I got a
Water meter because I was getting charged for what I used and that makes the difference to just sort of you know running the Taps when you clean your teeth and all those sort of things so it is I think changes people’s perceptions and the way they do things I think so
Anything that helps that has got to be pretty good so yes sorry apologies human to the environment agency um I completely agree I think communication and engagement is key certainly the last three years working with agriculture um no disrespect some of them head in the sand in terms of
What was coming so the maps that Daniel uh used provided that Clarity for change and I think we need the same thing for the general public and I just just refer to what I think was a really clear message uh James bevans our former CEO’s George of death statement at the water R
Conference four years ago as waterwise conference this week where he said geores of death the point where our demand outstripped Supply 20 to 30 years away away we’re already 20% in and nothing’s changed all that much and I think the public need to understand where the water comes from and
Potentially the value of that water because covid everyone bought a hot tub you know it was the thing to do it isn’t the water that’s causing hot tubs you know it’s proliferated the the purchase of hot tubs now they’re being switched off because the energy cost is
Too much they can fill it easily and they probably would because they don’t understand the impact of that water thank you for that I think that’s a point we’ll consider when we come to our recommendations yes Charles uh yeah and thank you for the recognition of Agriculture sort of being being on that
Journey that is really sort of being driven by economics and necessity um and actually if you have a look at what’s happening in uh across the pond in Italy and Spain at the moment they’ve got far more acute challenges than we have at the moment and I think it’s in Italy
They’re actually striking at the moment having protests because of um some um pretty hefty restrictions on on access to water going on so I think in some ways um I’m not sure I have an answer or s a solution or or a suggestion but changing public perception is incredibly
Difficult and is long long game um but necessity and things like hose pipe bounds is what really sharpens The public’s mind so I’m not sure I have a suggestion but um certainly across across the ponds um they’re really talking about water resources and a a domestic level in terms of things like
Leakages and um using more efficient showers and less baath fill and all these kind of things those discussions are happening in those countries but we’re not we’re not there yet because we’re not it’s not being driven by necessity okay thank you for that uh next question is from Council
Fleming thank you and um I I Echo what’s been said about the presentations and and you know thank you all for coming collectively to this room to um to to meet with us it’s it’s really um is a privilege um I just want to um I’ve got
A number of questions but um I’d like to focus on the agricultural sector a bit I represent the heart ismir division um lot of farmers and of course um I’m very aware of the um constraints on water use um in the eye area um when I first read the W strategy
I was struck by the fact that um it seems that agriculture is um whether consciously or not sort of afforded a lower tier priority than public Supply and um and another uses and that actually concerned me because um I have read Defence food strategy and Etc and
It seems to me that defra right at the top of our government does not seem to have the um understanding of how important food Security is to this country and a lot of what defra is saying you know rightly is climate change environment um etc etc but the assumption is that we would
Import a good part of our food supply now um that isn’t actually helping climate change or the environment at all and I think that thinking right at the top of government needs to switch the more we produce here the less effect we will have globally on climate change um
Having said that going back to agriculture I do have some a question concerning what the change from a licensing to a permitting regime will mean for our Farmers especially about the pace at which it might might be introduced because I don’t feel that agriculture is in a position to weather
Any more storms so if we take away we have to give back and um so that is that is my first question the second one is I was very heartened to see um in your letter Graham um a note about funding from defra for the kind of projects that we’ve been
Talking about and which I think are a huge part of the solution to the problems um that we have especially here in East Anglia um so my question is how soon can we get onto this where’s the money going to come from it’s clearly going to be expensive and the investment
Will have to come from probably beyond the agricultural sector which um also leads me um to a third small question for um Phil isbel um who I know represents mids suffk and babber but not the whole of suffk and um very pleased to look at the policy sp8
Where water infrastructure is seen as potentially um a sill um um item so that money can actually be recovered through sill possibly not to the extent we might need but um at least there there that’s a very positive statement there how are we going to pay for the changes we
Need yeah thank you um with the move from our licensing process to the environmental permitting regulations we’re we’re still waiting to find out when that will happen but it’s estimated in Autumn 2025 um from our perspective it’s purely a legislative change to bring it in line with our other regulations around water
Quality um waste Etc there shouldn’t be any material change to an abstractor in that um we can review licenses now under six years under our license renewals Etc for permit that’s exactly the same we can renew it if we think there’s a pressure on the catch B I think what it
Allows us to do that the move to the through environment permit regulations and the environment Act is allow us to treat everybody equitably and favorably which we can’t do currently gra alluded to permanent licenses of right uh where if we believe they’re damaging then we may be able to go after the larger
License that have thus far been unprotected so I see the move to environment permitting regulation and our ability to be collaborative around catchment far more um beneficial to abstractors okay I’m I’m I’m concerned about the fact that um overall less water will be available to the sector under the new
Regime I I think with demand and what have you I think less water is available to all sectors has already been shown we need to find a way of doing that collectively which I think the move to epr and the catchment reviews will allow us to do there will there will be less
Water we need to find ways to resolve that yes uh just to pick up your first question about the status of Agriculture within the Water Resources East plan so as I’m as I mentioned we are we are set up on a multi sector basis we’ve got the national Farmers Union we’ve got the
Association of drainage authorities alongside energy companies water companies who signed off our plan so it’s it’s a kind of Collective Agreement in approving our plan and Publishing it for for de member we are somewhat hampered at least we have been in the past by the amount of funding that we’ve
Had uh on behalf of the sector to invest in studies which support agricultural needs but that is changing so the environment agency has now secured funding from government to provide the regional groups with sources of funding to be able for us so we can support the agricultural sector to to seek out new
Sustainable sources of water supply and we’re working very closely with the East suffk Water abstractor group on potential options and there’s uh new guidance being developed it’s being piloted in Cambridge and hopefully that will then be rolled out across across the region uh to support other parts but
I guess one thing you may be referring to is that the the water companies have a have the ability to argue the overriding public interest when the environment agency says that you need to restrict or reduce uh your abstraction from a particular uh groundwater or surface water source so they can they
Can Lodge an appeal under uh overriding public interest uh make that argument and they may in doing so be able to retain that license for longer as long as there in mitigation in place the agricultural sector does not have that ability to argue the overriding public interest because in stat in in
Legislation rightly or wrongly uh providing water for sanitation clean water for drinking is seen as a higher priority and a different priority for uh water for agriculture it is something we raise within our regional plan it’s something that the nfu is obviously Keen to kind of raise with government but as
It stands uh there is a difference between the rights that uh water company abstractors have as opposed to agricultural abstractors have but that’s just what the legislation says okay uh thank you um yeah thank you for raising the the the issue of imports um it is an issue in that um you know
The public will continue to want to eat the same amount of food and same same variety of food um out of season which they currently do um and um the the the buyers the retailers will continue to to source that food from from wherever they can
And if we don’t produce it here it’s going to be imported and there’s an important point about um how they’re produced aboard as well in that there’s an awful lot of uh chemicals which we don’t have access to which are are licensed overseas and are used in food
Production um so in some ways we’d be uh I use the phrase exporting our environmental conscience if we were to start import bringing food bringing food in from from abroad there are of course things like coconuts and melons which we’re not going to start growing anytime soon but nevertheless there are um you
Know things like strawberries peppers carrots onions potatoes those kind of Staples um some of which are Glass House grown some of which are field field based uh which we uh should be growing here um and uh yeah uh but in terms of I mean a few of the points were were well
Made already but um the in terms of the changes coming out in the licenses the key point is the time for adaptation we’ve been talking about and and good noce we’ve good noticed there are measures such as the um investment in more efficient kit thinking about how they
Can use water more efficiently which will keep them farming um you know for for for for a good period of time um but the challenge becomes longer term when those if reduction start having to increase U more compens um with the the change in the system the um the
Licensing system the the sort the individual um Case by case sort of treatment is is is very welcome um uh but I suppose we’re we’re we we still wait to be seen what those reductions will look like come come 2028 and quite what what those figures may be in the
Impacts so we’re kind of at the the thin end of the wedge at the moment I think and it’s those longer term more strategic heavier Investments like um winter fill reservoirs and things which is is the kind of the solution I think long longer term okay and I think your question fill was
It and in terms of the um the issue that um B mid suffk face certainly you talked about policy sb8 the expectation is that the heart asmir water uh Supply infrastructure network will uh see an upgrade but that’s from 2032 now in April last year there was a consultation
That uh ofwat um issued following their their view of uh an attempt to get some accelerated funding for uh some works at great ellingham I believe um to that Network which have might may have brought forward that um solution to the the network and I don’t think that was
Successful so there’s clearly other attempts being made to uh secure funding for the necessary infrastructure improvements but until they’re in place they’re not in place and I don’t think the district sill given the level of development we likely to see in these areas is going to be a solution to that particular uh
Issue okay thank you yes yeah just um you mentioned about the grants and how quickly we can get on this was talking to uh some some of the um water abstractor groups and they’re already um using some of the grants around for the reservoirs um I think there’s a couple
In suffk that are that are happening as well which is really good so they’re already on to these grants they they don’t cover all the funding I don’t believe and and there is I think it’s the last some of the farmers telling there’s a seven-year payback on this so
That they they’re investing for the long term here about how they then recruit some of that money of putting those reservoirs in but but they are very proactive working with that and the agency and NF you and others are are supporting them as much we can with those
Grants well thank you that’s really good good to know thank you great thank you for that uh councelor Everett thank you very much indeed um agriculture I’m being in agriculture now living on it near it and part of it for some time and it always amazes me
That the farmers are doing an awful lot to help themselves mold draining they mold drain all their fields all the water then just goes into the mold rins and disappears into the rivers as an awful lot quicker than it would and if it was allowed to sort of seep into the
Soil like it normally does into the aquafers so um are we looking how to address that the use of that water that is there at certain times when there’s Heavy Rain to be able to move that back into the the reservoirs the witer reservoirs that you’ve spoken about and
I’m just going to keep chitty chatting on the basis of they sort of run into one another so back to the winter fill re reservoirs um the cost implications to Farmers there need to be addressed and and I’m I’m not sure I would countenance giving money to Farmers to
Build reservoirs but I very happy to loan money to Farmers to build reservoirs that they could pay back at a reduced interest rate government fund it they’ve just given 50 million pounds to our good friends at East Anglia Anglia water to stop the spills of sewage into
Our Rivers 50 million they’ve given them God knows what they do with their money before that but anyway there we are so farmers could be given loans over a long period of time at a reduced rate to help build their reservoirs now now not I’m I’m just looking at the little um um
Slide here apparently we’re not going to start building our new reservoirs I know they’re slightly different but however until 2039 40ish it says here new reservoirs 2040 so if we know the Train’s leaving Cambridge now it will be a dip switch in a few hours minutes it’s on its way if
We know that we’re going to be running out of water in 2050 what the hell are we doing waiting to 2038 40 before we start doing anything that’s like leaving the station Master need little restroom for until the damn thing arrived half an hour after it’s arrived say oh the trains arrived we
Know it’s coming so let’s do it now rather than wait like we do um for many things until it’s too late sorry about that but I get a bit just a little bit wound up on this because it’s we we’ve known for years in um two 1976 when I got married 75 my
Wife would kick me if IID say that and 1976 there was a drought a very hot summer I was lucky enough to be given an a fort Anglia with a plastic seat just what I wanted however we know it’s coming we we’ve been been told about the climate change sorry
Um but it is coming we know it’s coming so let’s deal with it before it gets here will be my comment and um um yes I think probably at that point I’ll stop thank you very much and for listening okay yep thank you uh just on the major
Reservoirs that you mentioned so they are being progressed right now and it does take 10 to 15 years to build uh to plan for to construct and to fill a major reservoir of the scale the two that I mentioned in the CER fence and South linshire so both Reservoir
Projects have already been subject to public consultation there’s a further round first round of stat public consultation this summer uh there will be a uh an application under development consent order to the Secretary of State next year uh that may take a couple of
Years so as you can as you can see it takes quite a long time to build a new reservoir of the scale of graph and water and two are being delivered in parallel within the east of England but they are part of yeah that part that part of that long-term Water Resources
Picture the Strategic work gentleman I’m not sure who it is but somebody needs to be um asked that question why didn’t we do it sooner again I think you’ve just asked that question and we’ll get response to it yeah just just respond on that point
I think it’s fair to say that in both cases those reservoirs have been in the pipeline for some time just in terms of kind of feasibility stages looking at uh site selection the site selection process so it’s not as if we’re it’s a standing start just right at this moment
What what’s different is that uh this is W’s first ever Regional plan which looks to 2050 and Beyond and takes into account importantly exactly what water needs will be needed over the next 25 years for the environment uh usually it’s done on a a 5 to 10 year basis you
Looking 5 to 10 years ahead we’re now looking 25 years ahead we’re factoring in climate change uh in terms of the kind of changing rainfall patterns and we’ve also got that um more ambitious uh standard for Drought resilience which the government has only set so it’s a kind of combination of those uh
Different factors forcing uh water companies to think about more water storage that have suddenly brought the importance of these two Reservoir projects to to the four okay thank you well yeah yeah thank you um so just on on sort of your question about the drainage side of things um you’re
You’re right in that there’s extensive uh land drainage um this is has been going on for for for many decades in order to be uh help the land be more productive but one of the things we are seeing in terms of a shift in farming is to improve soil quality so it retains
Water better so that’s increasing things like soil organic matter through more regenerative farming practices the likes of uh no till um no till crop establishments so less soil disturbance and that kind of thing so that there’s uh a better retention of water within the soil body itself and less uh less
Runoff during times of of of uh flooding and and high high rainfall um but um your next s Point around um I should say that helps the field veg guys it doesn’t do anything for The Glass House sector which needs an awful lot of water as
Well um but in terms of uh Lo loans for Reservoir um production um yeah sounds great we like to hear more about what what that might look like in in practice and how to communicate that uh it is a big barrier for particularly the smaller farms in the capital expenditure it’s a
Lot of upfront cost so whil there the uh current water management grants which may contribute half million pounds towards a 1.2 million pound project for instance um that money needs to be stumped up up front and that includes the risk as well so that includes the concerns around finding gray crested use
Iological surveys all the other things that can can go wrong they would they have to upfront a lot of that cost so the the risk factor is something that also weighs on Farmers Minds a lot when considering um whether or not to uh go down the uh the Winterfield Reservoir
Type route as well as concerns of whether or not that actually get a license to be able to fill it in the first place okay microphone please can I um ask why we’re not insisting on the likes of prons and wimpy and all those people putting in
Gray water storage in every new house they buil along of course with a solar panel if we could as part of the planning applications it seems to me they were missing a huge opportunity there where all that water is just going into drains and then causing some of the
Problems that we have around flooding where are we with that so the government’s approach broadly speaking has been to align um planning restrictions to building regulation um so the approach that uh you see in our policies in in babber mid suffk effectively pick up on what we can
Expect and and they follow the building regulations principles about what we can require of developers so it’s not uh it’s not something that gives us a huge degree of local discretion to apply uh you know for whatever technology you might want to use today or tomorrow um
So we we’re essentially in that hands of national government in terms of its approach to what we can apply on National Regional developers with their builds yes Daniel y um but this situation is rapidly evolving um driven by the canbridge uh growth constraints caused by water
Scarcity um so as you say in 2015 there’s a written ministerial statement by Eric pickles the then housing secretary saying that essentially there needs to be consistent national standards for water efficiency across the whole of the country country so there’s a Level Playing Field for developers that basically stops planning
Authorities from setting tighter water efficiency standards requiring rainwater harvesting gray water recycling within individual developments that’s now been uh overruled by a new written m still statement from Michael Gove just before Christmas so as of now planning authorities can negotiate with Developers for individual application to say for this Housing Development for
This commercial developments you need to install brain as a condition essentially of getting planning approval uh as well there was a joint statement as I mentioned earlier from uh defra and duu last week uh announcing there will be a review of building regulations this spring again to tighten the water
Efficiency standard potentially down from I think the the stretch Target is 110 liters per person per day potentially down to 100 liters per person per day potentially lower still than that and with potentially uh some kind of requirement some kind of incentive potentially to install gray water Recycling and rainwater harvesting
But there’s also a problem with drinking water regulations at the moment which prevent dual pipe work being installed within home so you get like the pure the drinking water supply and you get a second pipe system which provides uh non-potable water through rainwater harvesting um so at the moment drinking
Water regulations prevent communal supplies of nonpotable water to new households because of concerns of cross-contamination you know a an untrained plumber just tapping into you know fit fitting a new bathroom tap and using the wrong pipe work but there will be new regulations that allow those jeel
Pipes to be installed and hopefully that will be reflected in building regulations to to encourage developers to to be as more as water efficient as possible so watch this space but certainly there is now more flexibility already and potentially increasing flexibility for planning authorities to set tighter water efficiency standards in new
Development and if I can just come back in yeah in terms of residential development at least our own policy LP 23 and the joint local plan does talk about that 110 L limit and talks about 100 lers as an aspiration that’s encouraged um but the language of the policies encourage rather than
Require okay thank you very much yeah just add one more point that accepting everything everybody said about the regulation and how we have our hands tied actually there are situations where we as a statutary consult in terms of the flood risk management that I talked about earlier can look at an OP
Opportunities for reusing that water we think about gray water systems potentially being used in the household but that might not be the best thing to do because there’s lots of extra additional cost and pipe work how could we best use that water where does it have most value locally and there’s
Examples now um I’m thinking in East suffk where um large Housing Development has come forward and we’re looking at um designing the surface water drainage system to push more water quicker down to Felix do hydr cycle which is then going to use that water for agricultural irrigation so we we’re designing that
Housing development looking at where that water falls looking at how we can manage it in a way to a place where we know it’s got value and is going to be reused so there are different ways of skinning a okay very good going to go on to the next question which is councelor
Rita yes thank you very much and fantastic uh presentations and information that we’ve got that you know two days ago I didn’t know any of this so this is is really good uh and as we get through the questions my question I think you’ve answered it 90% And just
Building on what Robert was saying um and that was one I was picking up about these reservoirs but I think obviously those are long-term projects they take long period of time they’re very expensive Etc so coming back to Agriculture and the smaller type of r on
A farm would appear to be the one that could be done more quickly less expensively you just said Charles that it still could be 2 million and there’s a grant for half a million and where you going to find the other 1.5 million I accept that but could you just give us a
Little bit of indication of how tricky it is to build these smaller reservoirs on a on a farm and also the planning applications that you have to go because I’d have thought we’re absolutely crying out for it and I can’t see that these would be in areas where people would object
Because um you know they’re not going to be uh noisy they’re not going to be um a problem so that and just to build on on on a question as you’ve answered most of that but if you can just give me a little bit and a little bit of a a naive
Question if I may because we always hear about water companies talking about leaks and obviously a water company doesn’t want to leak if they’re moving water down a pipe to get to somebody’s house and if it leaks it won’t get out of the tap but as I say this is where
The odd question going to come but surely when there is a leak that water goes back into the system naturally and therefore why is a leak such a big problem okay okay um yeah so just supposed to explain a little bit about what’s involved in building a small small kind
Of scale Reservoir um so you’re probably talking a couple of hectares or so or they do they do vary in size uh compared to the ones we’ve been talking about with the fence Reservoir I think that’s a th000 hectares so it’s a whole different kettle of fish um the um soil
Type is important ideally you want some some clay when you when you dig down to be able to to build the banks um the banks are often reinforced um with with stone and everything as well um finding contractors can be challenging is quite spe specialist work they are in high
Demand at the moment no reservoirs are getting built because it’s so wet and sticky out there so no so things are on pors at the moment because of the uh the the wet winter period we’ve had um some of the challenges people have can be things around uh from local residents do
Visual side of it um so often they are they are raised a bit so people have concerns over how it’s going to look I would argue that really shouldn’t be such an issue because they often go grass banked in the end and just look like a green green bit in a distance um
There’s uh sometimes safety concerns um there has been uh not much in the UK but there has been abroad issues where reservoirs have burst and of course major major issues because there’s a large volume of water that’s not something we’ve really had much over here but is still something that that
Pops up um I think there of is often um well the feedback so what I hear from from people who’ve been through the process is um just trying to mitigate some of the concerns around the loss of sort of agricultural productive land as well um often they do try and get it on
More grade 3B or four land which is the less productive agricultural land um but there’s often a whole range of sort of concerns which are raised back at the farmer from the planet and if if it takes quite a long time to answer some of those some of those questions um but
You you’re right to point out that um they are kind of in a way a quick win to some of this solution because three or four years to build one of those is a lot quicker than it takes to build anything like the the angling water um
Big fence projects um but uh yeah I’m not sure if that sort of answered answered your questions but yeah there it’s easy easy said than done building a small Reservoir um and the far and the farmer often needs to think about what his future cropping plans are so does he
Have coal stores does he have uh you know the equipment for growing uh more or the same amount of those kind of particular water heavy crops it’s quite different kind of world the fresh produce producing world than it is to the arable or livestock World in terms
Of the what what’s required in terms of sort of investment and Manpower and all those kind of things yeah Phil can you pick up the planning bit of that yeah certainly yeah there there are two options really to a farmer looking to build a reservoir and
And one is to um apply and uh seek to get permission through a PRI notification process which is an abbreviated planning process effectively you’re not providing the full details of that Reservoir but there are limitations inherent in um regulations about how large that can be and and how it relates to adjacent
Dwellings and other things so there are options to do that and in the example I gave you at fennings Farm one of the solutions to uh water supply for that unit was proposed as a uh a permitted development uh Reservoir which uh the district council processed and and uh
Has has agreed to so that’s one one option and the other is to make a planning application in the usual way and that will be subject to consultation as you’d as you’d normally EXP expect um we’re not not blind to the issues that um face uh Farmers trying to find water
Supply and clearly uh you know planning process is expected to promote and place significant weight on economic Prosperity but we’ve OB got to undertake a range of consultations and one of the issues we sometimes encounter with these is what happens with the minerals which may be extracted at the time you create
Of reservoir and that’s obviously of interest to the county counil in with its own planning functions okay thank you and the leakage thing can you actually waste water does it not sort of just Rec come back again I I guess it does eventually I mean the amount of fresh water on planet
Earth I think is relatively consistent stable um let’s not get into the cryosphere and everything else uh but yeah so leakage does matter because in general you’re taking water out of the stream upstream and when leakage happens it happens Downstream and whilst some of
It will go back into the ground a lot of it just runs down streets into the dang Network into the water courses and out to sea and then and then you’ve lost it um leakage also matters rep matters reputationally for water companies you know no one as a customer wants to see
Their street leaking massively disruptive in terms of when those leaks need to be fixed and it all costs money it costs uh money it’s very carbon intensive to pump water around so you really don’t want to be wasting water if you can possibly avoid it okay thank you uh councilor
Scar thank you chair um councelor Everett has already asked a question about gray water um and I think there’s a lot to be done with gray water I think that needs to play a much bigger role in the 25-year plan um my question was on
Page 35 um it talks about um due to the shortage of water in eastern England the plan involves no new transfers of water out of the water resources east region to other parts of the country so uh question is the linkage between the Water Resource um different units around
The country um and is there actually any water that is transported from the east of England to other Water Resource areas because that kind of implies there’s no new which kind of implies there is an existing yes there is so at the moment angan water provides water to Affinity
Water down in the temps Valley and actually one of the options within our regional plan is for that transfer to be switched off and the water instead to be provided to Cambridge in order to support the amount of growth that they’re seeing there but as you say uh
Water Resources East is one of the five Regional planning groups as part of producing our regional plan there were various rounds of what we called Regional reconciliation of plans to make sure they all stitch together in the National interest and one of the main things that we were looking at is the
Means by which you could transfer from region to region so not creating a kind of National Water grid which people have talked about but through a series of intermediary steps can you basically move water from the North and the west of the country to the South and the East
Which needs it so desperately and one of the main ways in which we’re going to get water into the east of England through the Grand Union Canal so Water Resources West investing in new kind of water treatment works in the west country uh putting water into the Grand
Union Canal using that as a means to transfer water down to the Affinity water Zone as I say so they can back off their abstraction from anglian water allowing anging water supply Cambridge so this is all you know a series of interconnected steps but that shows the
Value of stepping back and showing that it’s not just for water companies themselves to resolve the challenges they face Cambridge water being a case and point very small water company lots of growth very few options for them themselves but by working as part of a region and actually nationally we can
Help to resolve some of these long-term scarcity challenges councelor well thank you CH thank you for the presentations um there are I think fairly simple questions but yeah they need answering I think one one of my concerns is about roof water collection um Matt you explained about you we’ve
Got these big sheds and we ought to be collecting the water uh and then selling selling it I guess to the a nearby farmer providing it’s an next door farmer if that is done then the amount of water into the water course it would have naturally flown
Uh would have run off from the fields into the water calls there’s going to be less water into the water Coes are we going to have a reduction in river water quality in some places where we’re building these big sheds and not putting the water into the river uh are there
Environmental disbenefits that we need to be aware of that’s one question the other question it it’s it’s for GR really I think um you talked rightly about the need to reduce abstraction and it’s a longterm plan and so on um I’m thinking about a couple of I would guess big uses
Of of water um and I picked these at random um it’s it’s the green the green King Brewery and the sugar beat Factory both in Berry they have no opportunity I guess to actually store water above ground because of their location and if you were to they probably need more and
More water each year rather than less and less um because you can’t reuse water that’s been used to put into beer until years yeah further down the line um so are we in danger are we in danger of forcing some businesses to move away from where they have been
Operating um because they’re going to have their water extra abstraction rates reduced okay thank you I think uh my experience green King put quite a lot of water in their beer [Laughter] actually yes careful yeah so gr you want to answer that I was just going to comment on the rainwater harvesting so
We have a another statement as as we do for rainwater harvesting currently we’re not of the view that it’s of a magnitude that it would affect uh what we call the environmental flow indicator in the rivers we are now looking at that because there’s a big solar Farms being proposed
With guttering to capture rainwater so I think the scale of capture is going to be sharp Focus but currently we’re not of the view because rain waterer isn’t licensable when it hits your roof you can you can collect it we’re not of the view that it harms the environment but
That could change as the scales of the developments change as soon as you’ve got one big shed lo and behold there’s another big shed grows up in a couple of years time so these are tend to be concentrated in specific areas I’m thinking about Stow
Market to degree and also on the edge of berry um but it’s not a problem yet but somebody’s keeping an eye on it I guess absolutely thank you I have asked that question myself thank you oh sorry yeah on the um the specifics around green King and and
Sh I don’t know the ins and outs of the details of there but it’s not our intent and hence why we want to be working with the industries who know their business best know what they can and can’t do to see how they they can adapt there might
Be some things there about water trading and other things but that I think they’re still being looked at about how they might work so it’s something we’re we’re looking at really keen and we are tuned into the fact that these are some significant changes we’re asking any any
Industry to to make um and and how they could get go and do that and I I think you know even agriculture it won’t be the same answer everywhere but agriculture will be different to to some of the other Industries as well so we need to make sure we’re continuing to
Work with them and hence by giving that time to adapt as well and we’ve the challenges we’ve got in Norfolk where we’ve not been we’ve not got the luxury of time we’ve got to go uh faster that is you know creating a whole different challenge for businesses whereas in
Suffk we we’re in early now and if we could give that time it does give businesses time to make those adaptions and think how might work differently in suffk yes Richard chair I’m anxious that there is no legal action against suff County Council about your comments about water
In the beer of green King and uh I think it was said because you’re a former employee of adnams and I quite understand that of course both who I will say produce excellent beer um can I just say that uh as you will know be Brewing is a fairly cyclical process and
Certainly I recently visited uh British sugar in bis and Edmunds and they do reuse as much water as they possibly can thank you very much for that Richard to save my blushes um is it sobering thought though actually isn’t it that if green King for instance wanted to move
Their Brewery into say bab mid suffk potentially they wouldn’t get planning permission unless they were water neutral I mean that’s that’s an interesting thought isn’t it of where we are today compared with probably 30 30 odd years ago or something so uh interesting thoughts yeah okay next questioner is councelor
Adams thank you very much um I agree with a lot of what’s been said this morning and I think your presentations are truly amazing I think the biggest thing that we have to get across is changing people’s attitude to water and I do remember 76 councelor ab and I
Remember after 76 a reservoir where I lived in ipwi was built over um now in 76 we knew there was a problem and yet we were building over reservoirs with housing and housing developers now have much smaller Gardens than they used to and people are bu building over their
Driveways so that they haven’t got front Gardens anymore and we are our worst enemies at all of this because we want more cars we want to have Sprouts all the way through the year or tangerines or whatever um the fundamental issue of changing people’s latitude is huge I
Mean I can remember hose pipe bands I can’t remember the last one that we had I mean there probably has been one um but it really does make people shock people and there was the question is um does everybody now have a water meter because there was a whole
Thing about installing them throughout every property in the UK and I know people who tried to avoid it because they didn’t want to be Meed thanks very much what what happened to that plan two I get a communication from Anglia water four times a year and as far as I can
See what they’re encouraging me to do is take out insurance with them I I see nothing about water savings I don’t know what Happ to hippo bags in toilets or um having a water butt or all of these things that we used to do in the past we
Now have god-given right to have a shower every single day if not two or three and when I was little it’s quite a long time ago but you know you’d have a bath once a week and everybody go it but but you know but but you know the our
Attitude towards water I think it’s truly horrendous and okay 14 of us from the County Council here today 75 wants me Richard and um RAM have had our way but that’s tiny even if I go and tell everybody I know um but there needs to be some massive great campaign and I you
Working with Department of Transport about you know the number of cars on the road because that again is increasing pollution and all the rest of it and while people building over their drives all the water is going into the water system going out to sea so so again you
Know everything we do operates against everything you’re doing so what’s the greatest risk to the Water Resources plan for e and in England is it humans basically um there there is definitely an element of behavior change that is necessary and as you say I think water use is nearly doubled within a
Generation because we’re just used to showering and you know turning the Taps on you know Leisure use of water has increased and particularly since not everyone has a hot tub but lots of people do um and so I mentioned that water companies themselves have uh you know customer engagement campaigns
Usually around the spring and summer months but actually the uh water sector regulator ofwat has now launched a fund I think it’s 100 million pound to put into consumer engagement in this kind of wider sense and so you could see again more activity happening jointly between water companies local authorities
Potentially with uh parts of government as well more concerted campaign that happens year round to try and just encourage people uh to use more water efficiency efficiently think about what they’re using uh to invest in more water efficient uh devices tap showers toilets that kind of thing um because it clearly
Is um yeah clearly is really important um one thing just back to back to the drought uh is people remember 1976 as being really dry but actually it was because it came on the back of 1975 which is also really really dry and that’s why people were so concerned in in about
2022 because that was a really sharp deep drought but if it continued into last summer then there would have been really quite significant difficulty as you say there were no host bike bands in 2022 within the east of England because of the value investing in Water Resources the reservoirs the transfer
Schemes whereas there were host pipe bands in Corall and parts of London um but it just shows that we do need to think uh longer term we do need to think about kind of drought resilience we do need to think about consumer engagement and back to Max point we think smart
Metering is going to be potentially gamechanging because not only will it be able to uh give for company’s ability to inform customers we think you’ve got a leaking toilet or some kind of internal supply pipe leak um but it also allows the kind of the apps that we were
Talking about for you know for customers to be given real time almost real time data on how much water they’re using hour by hour day day by day uh so yeah smart metering and again I think probably one of your first questions of how close we to a universal metering
We’re not there yet but we will get there so Anglia water has said that they will roll out smart meters by 2030 and S6 and suffk water I think it’s by 2035 they’re already amongst the highest kind of levels of penetration for for kind of Dum metering at the moment towards 80 I
Think 90% for Ang water but absolutely metering uh metered tariffs so everyone should be paying for the amount of water they use and potentially some Innovative tariffs as well whereby maybe water water becomes more expensive in the summer it’s just in a trial phase at the moment but in time you could imagine
Like you get Smart Energy tariffs to to encourage people to to charge their electric vehicle overnight when prices are cheap you might get encouraged to turn your dishwasher on overnight when it’s not you know the outbreak of East Enders or whatever it happens to be okay thank you does seem strange we
We seem to be playing catchup with some of these things because uh I think we’ve had smart meters for gas electricity for some time but we haven’t for water and actually it’s just an important Resource as as gas and electricity and the usage as well so I think smart meters probably
Should have in been stalled you know a few years ago but I mean I’m pleased to hear that that’s going to be rolled out by 2030 which will be good okay I’ve got uh two more on my list uh councelor Wilson and councelor bird yeah um the
Section 57 was mentioned in regards to restricting um and licensing on the spray irrigation but looking at the numbers um from our Workshop uh from Water Resources East it’s about um pration is about 18th um of our public usage amount and so regarding in sort of
Um almost the younger brother of the war resources act the flood and War management Act of sort 2010 it has some restrictions on the public Supply like the hose hose pipe ban you said I’m just wondering clarification Matt or or maybe philli um what the extent of the powers
Of the flood and what management Act is and and in your professional opinion should this be sort of strengthened to help sort of deal with the droughts within sort of times of well you know special sort of like like said like well the instance in like um 26 or
Say if 23 24 hadn’t been you know as wet as it is so would you mind saying a bit more about the question just because yeah the section 57 is to do with um curtailing existing abstraction licensing um so it’s about saying you know you need to stop abstract extracting here and now
Because we in a draft situation I don’t think that was underpinned by the flood water management act in this yeah it’s it’s the Water Resources act so um it actually relates to um councelor Adam’s question earlier in terms of you know my personal opinion I was the team leader responsible for
Issuing section 57s in 2019 there there are only powers to limit direct summer spray irrigators which is generally um agricultural crops some golf courses um why it’s prevalent is because they reduce up own demand in the worst time of the year so generally they’re driving up demand spraying their crops
When we have our wetest sorry our hottest driest times so we have to act because we go into hydrological drought conditions in the rivers so it’s the only Paras we have to stop someone someone doing the wrong thing between and it relates to your question I would
I would rather there in reality publicly when per from a personal experience I’m stopping our food producers and I can see my neighbors filling up paddling pools washing cars so I I would I would welcome a big picture conversation are you aware of the consequence of turning
Your tap on filling the paddling pool when the likes of myself have to restrict the food producers of the country okay good thank you very much uh the last one on my list councelor CH for hand up but councelor bird thank you chairman I I I I hadn’t
Intended to speak but that passionate speech by councelor Adam has animated me to to get on to the Hobby Horse subject um my this isn’t so much a question just to reiterate this point that we’ve raised about water wastage and and I mean to be honest metering isn’t the
Answer because I live in an area of metering and I’m seeing a proliferation of people cleaning their cars with these pressure hoses that use goodness knows how many more gallons and doing it like I do with a bucket and sponge um it it’s part of this as councel Adam has said
We’ve created this absurd world of of excessive consumption now um when I tell people I’ve never traveled on an airplane in my life they look at me like I told them I was born on the planet Mars um it’s and this water wastage um one issue
That hasn’t been raised up to now today on this subject but it’s all showing that these things are interconnected is is food wastage in this country we’ve been talking about how much water is used to produce the food and then we see absurd figures of how many millions
Of tons of whatever food that are thrown away in in Britain every year so that needs to be addressed but caner Adams made this valid point I get bills water bills and it it tells about taking Insurance out against water pipe leakage it doesn’t say anything about usage
Quite frankly we’ve got to we’ve got to put it on the par with with dog fowling and drink driving they used to be horrendous and and we’ve made it antisocial now and we’ve reduced it by people feeling that it’s antisocial Behavior to do that and we’ve got to do
That with this water usage it it incenses me when I see people cleaning cars with these pressure hoses and it’s just a new toy they got for Christmas and then their neighbor sees oh I’ll put it on my Christmas list and I’ll be the last person left
Quickly yeah thanks and just like Stuart I’m animated by Council Adam’s um speech there um the thing that comes to my mind is water water everywhere not a drop to drink we live on an island we are surrounded by water we’ve just had five months of continuous
Rain and yet we still need to sit here and find a solution for our children our children’s children which is very very important thank you and very quickly if I may chair and not uh relevant to today’s discussion food waste will be collected on a weekly basis by your
Local District Council I can’t remember the date it’s I think 2026 so you know that that that isn’t relevant to today’s discussion but progress is being made there yes I think that’s another topic for discussion and and we have gotten information bulletin coming to this committee I think in our next meeting in
May about food waste now that’s any burning I’m conscious of time uh and we need to have a break because we’ve been here over two hours so unless there’s any really really burning questions um I’m going to yes okay then you could have done like like some others but but you didn’t
So do you want to go now quickly um because I think this is important and by the way I hardly wash my car at all so I go one better than you councelor B um mine is about the so I live in a village
Where uh I moved in last July and I had a field with horses at the bottom of my road and it’s been a lake since October full of ducks and and swans now so that water how difficult or is it viable that that can be extracted from there to be
Used elsewhere because we talked about it but I’m thinking what will that cost what does it need how do you do it yeah uh for me that’s a very import important point and just a quick one for Daniel I think I didn’t understand um on this 400
Miay or water needed it says since the draft Regional plan in December 2023 the impact of government policy measures have been removed from projections of future future water use included instead in demand management options I don’t understand that why would it why is it not going to be included because I like
To know that we’ve got an A reasonbly accurate projection there and I just that went right over my head so if that could be explained as well please I think there was two questions there councelor cheny both at the beginning yes okay okay yes Daniel just on the last one
First of all congratulations for actually reading the pack in such detail to have spotted that um it’s it’s just a technical matter of moving those water savings from the Baseline position to uh what can be achieved through demand management so before all of our demand management stuff was based on what water
Companies were going to do and the things that government was going to do in policy terms was kind of ba baked into the the kind of do nothing line so we’ve just because it is a demand management option we want the government to be introducing policy that helps
Customers use less water we’ve included it now as a demand management moment but it is in there and yeah thank you I can yeah I think Matt are you answering the question okay well um I suppose the point the point is that um for abstracting from a muddy corner of a
Field um there’s probably not going to be enough volume there to make it worth worth anyone’s well to be blunt it’s probably going to be quite silty so it’s probably not going to be very easy to pump um it’s actually a big issue during uh times of high flow and floods is the
Quality of the water not just that there’s a lot of it it could be quite heavily silty um which can cause a whole raft of issues over silting of reservoirs is a big problem um we start to lose volume if you start pumping dirty water into them over a few years
Um and I doubt you it would be worthwhile to be honest and you need somewhere to put it for one so I mean yeah so so yeah pump pumping water out of corners of fields that are currently flooded is isn’t really a viable option so I can add some hope to that
Make you make you smile maybe now um so the um reclaim the rain project which I mentioned early doors is talking to Farmers um in a number of locations about how to capture that surface water flow and store it in a place that c and
Allow it to settle out in order to then pump it to um to Reservoir storage so the the answer is you can’t suck it out the bottom corner of a field when we’re in conditions like this but what you can do is plan for managing high surface water flows and capturing a proportion
Of that allowing some of it to then go back through the through the natural system so you’re not interrupting the flow of of normal water courses and then use that water for for spray irrigation and other purposes later to days so if you plan to do it and you and you invest
In the infrastructure then you can do it yeah okay thank you I think that’s good to end on a message of Hope there so thank you thank you for that uh I’m going to draw to a close now I think we’ve had a good good session uh I think
I’m sorry unfortunately I’m going to draw a line under it now with time restraints unfortunately but can I just thank once again all the witnesses for attending and giving up their time this morning I think it’s a very very interesting subject and who thought 20 30 years ago would’ be talking about the
Resource of water and how scarce it could be in the future so thank you all very much uh we’re going to take a short break well this talk of water makes me want to nip to the not so we’re going to have about a 10-minute break please and
Then we’ll come back to do some recommendations the witnesses you’re very happy to go we realize you’re busy people so we don’t expect you to come back afterwards uh but thank you once again e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e
E e e e okay are we all back thank you for that very good questions today um we’ve drafted Katherine’s drafted through the meeting some recommendations so uh you may well have your own I’m sure you have so if I just go through what we’ve got to see
Whether it’s captured what you feel um obviously we’ like to thank the witness for attending uh the meeting this morning and the information that they provided to us and we certainly well I think we support the aims of a regional Water Resources plan for East of England
We’d be silly not to wouldn’t we so I think we could put that in uh as a comment um one of the recommendations is is and this came out quite strongly I think from uh various members is to work with stakeholders uh not a great word stakeholders but to to work with uh
Stakeholders to ensure that there is a clear message to the public to encourage water conservation in homes and businesses obviously councelor bird and councelor cheny and councelor Adams uh is how that we can um influence or how they can influence uh residents and businesses to uh uh conserve water uh
Particularly uh showers leaking dual flush toilets and watering the garden and cleaning the cars um of which we’ll increase users bills people need to understand that where water comes from and how valuable is I think you know because we’ve live in a world where they’ve never really been in this
Position before they’ve they’ve always sort of had plenty of water and we’re surrounded by water aren’t we in this in this country so people don’t take water as seriously as they do as other utilities and probably that needs to change uh something around uh promoting Smart Meters uh I know counc bird said
That’s not the answer but I I think it does help certainly did with me I think um recommend some recommendations about gray water um should be considered much more seriously as a resource um we don’t not certain who we make that recommendation to if You’ got any thoughts on that uh again Lobby
National government to allow more flexibility for planning authorities to set tighter standards for order efficieny measures um and um make certain or we’ll ask the question whether all planning committees in suffk are considering if they have enough water resources I’m sure they do we only obviously heard from one District today
Um but we’d like reassurances that all planning committees in suffk are considering Water Resources issues so that’s some we’ve got um anything add to that or to supplement those councel CH to the first one that was me that mentioned it to start with and what I
Was trying to say it that all those different messages have got to come we’ve got to get across they’re the tactics but I think like reclaim the rain there’s a one sentence message that all of that stuff feeds into so it becomes well known um and people hear it
So it really makes them think about saving their water that’s what I think we need I think there’s too many different messages it’s wrapped up in climate chain people switch off just a message and then all those different things different departments can feed into bodies involved agencies isn’t
There so I think what you’re saying is actually if if if they get together so we we could recommend that all the agencies and bodies get together to provide a single message about Water Resource yeah okay we we’ll we’ll word something around that yeah thank great thank you anything else anyone else yes
Councelor Fleming just to remind you obviously we are still live so yeah oh yeah I thank you I will mind my language I just want to be sure we’ve captured the um just the the desire and urgency even of working with um the farming sector and and trying to make
Happen those um smaller scale water conservation projects that we’ve been talking about which apparently there is some deer funding available now so you know let’s try to grab that and um come up with some if we could come up with some new areas where you know applications you know could be developed
It would be really positive I don’t know what Matt thinks but you know you probably know how much money is available and how practical it is and what sort of resource would be needed from the County Council to do that all these are questions that um you
Know we need to to be asking anyway with Farmers a bit but probably there a bit more to do is the Matt do you think there’s something we could sort of recommend we you know work closer with with the agricultural industry yep so it’s probably not so much thinking about where it should
Happen because that probably should be driven by um the farmers in terms of what their demands are and where they want to to uh to invest but probably the practicalities of delivering it when they’ve decided where it should happen um is something that we do have an
Interest in so when you’re um when you’re uh building a reservoir you obviously you’re obviously digging material out of the ground which we have an interest in in terms of our minerals and waste planning role so there may may be something there in terms of additional guidance and support because
There are instances where you know you could generate some of the income required to to invest in the in the reservoir by extracting the minerals which then could be used but there are planning issues that you have to deal with when when understanding that so we
Don’t get into a place where people are just digging holes with the excuse of building Reservoir to extract money to to to sell aggregate so um so there are issues there there are issues in terms of archaeology that that can become a real barrier and cost to uh to um a
Farmer that wants to build a reservoir because you may have to undertake detailed in archaeological investigation so it’s cost a lot of money so there may be a way that we could work with um agriculture to provide better guidance and advice to them about what the likely
Costs might be and how they can be minimized um so and and also obviously working with our colleagues in the district councils about how we can provide good advice to to uh land owners to make sensible decisions and ease the process going forward and look for
Opportunities to to smooth the way to to get reservoirs approved so yeah um could I just add could we possibly tie that into um you know flood mitigation as well because um I know there are some instances I know of about three in my division where relatively minor um water water
Storage um units could go a long way towards mitigating flooding if they’re built in the right place it seems to me it needs to be made bit easier for for farmers and other businesses to provide water storage doesn’t it really it’s there seems to be
A lot of hurdles in place at the moment and uh probably puts them off I mean Financial is is one of the biggest ones I guess so yes cancel ever yeah I’m all for helping Farmers for sure sure they do need our assistance when where and
When we can however they have to help themselves as well because we had the questions at our earli meeting yesterday around um ditches you know there is water storage on the roads at the moment because they don’t clear the ditches out because it can’t run away and so if
You’re going to be putting in um uh small reservoirs and you’re drawing it from the Water Source that’s on your land which is coming through ditches and we talked about mole drainage and that sort of thing you’ve got to make sure that those ditches are clear and when
They cut their Hedges they just leave the debris in the dishes which then fill up with debris which then means you can’t get the water to flow away as quickly if you’d like it to so they there is an element of helping themselves to do what they needs to be
Done and now that’s an educational thing I I don’t know but they always B no I’m not going to go down that route but anyway I just think there’s there’s opportunity I think perhaps that’s the tradeoff perhaps there’s a it’s a two-way thing isn’t it really you know
We help them they help us and everyone’s a winner really so okay thank you anything else yes councelor Wilson well in regards to sort of the water storage and water efficiency we have a carbon um we have a Whole Net Zero program for our properties um so why not something
Similar in regards to the water because there’s plenty of stuff we could do just of a house and other property or you know dep cabinet property now maybe reviewing our properties see how efficient they are and how we take measures to you know reduce it is is that possible could that be
Fitted into the sort of carbon I think it already is so yes not very much but it was built in the original process yeah do you want something around that though just to so that we can re reinforce that just that we can you know uh wein I say we could
Reinforce that uh what’s happening at the moment in terms of water storage uh in our own buildings and properties because we’ve obviously got to put our own house in order hav we bit disturbing the guy went around the toilets I think and you know found all leaky toilets but
Anyway yes yes I was glad I wenten in there when he came right actually yeah councilor scar I was just going to say CH just building on what was just being said I mean obviously as one of the largest land owners in the county we
Also have D with our County Farms um and maybe we can look at um the way that our County Farms are operated and the scheme in order to produce um reservoirs Etc and the help that we might be able to give to our own tenants for example to
Look at more efficient use of water by you know building their Reservoir ET I think again it’s something we could reinforce really isn’t you know possib yeah okay okay we got that so that’s pretty good then I think what we’ll do as we normally do we’ll put
Them together and send them around for you for uh agreement or Amendment or whatever before we finalize them okay thank you for that then we’re going to move on uh to item six which is the uh review of flood risk management scrutiny in suffk uh as you heard earlier councel
West uh senses apologies but councelor WS is here uh as his Deputy um couple things I just want to say beforehand is that uh um this is no way diminishing the role of that subcommittee which was set up some Years Ago by this committee um we we think the proposals well we’re
Convinced the proposals will uh strengthen the role um of districts and Burrows because it will be more place-based so we can can set up from this committee a task and finish group in the particular area where the flooding issue is happening um and that makes it very more localized and very
More personal to that area so so we’re not chucking this whole thing out the window we are actually we feel strengthening uh by bringing it back into the main committee but we’re not losing the contact with district and buroughs because it was so be very place-based if there’s a particular
Issue um so that’s all I think I wanted to say and I’m just going to hand over to uh uh is is jesser are you doing the next bit or is it Steve doing the next bit it are you I think yeah did you want to just do
Your I I’ll just say something really briefly because um I’ve had a couple of um emails of concern from members of the flood risk scrutiny subcommittee and um I absolutely believe this is the right approach for us to be taking now and that it’ll result in better um scrutiny
Of flood risk in the county we only when when this panel was set up in 2010 11 and then formed into a subcommittee I think um there were a lot more district and burough counselors available for a start and um the reason for its existence was to monitor the suffer
Flood risk management partnership and um it too is um considering changing its terms of ref reference to include a more formal role for district and burough councils and counselors and um the capacity also to set up task and finish groups that are location specific will I think be much more effective than the
System we have now so um I’ll hand over Matt if you want to add anything but I’m happy to support this proposal thank you Jessica um not too much to add um the I think the issue that we’ve got is is a subcommittee that um is scrutinizing the work of a relatively
Small team in the County Council and it’s not something that’s replicated elsewhere in the County Council it’s a sort team of eight to 10 people um and it’s got its own scrutiny subcommittee so there’s a there’s an issue there of is that um too much Focus so that that
Was one question that that has been sort of high in my mind um but obviously what we don’t want to do is reduce the amount of scrutiny that is required on the work of that team um so is there a more sensible way of arranging this which I
Think um is what what what is being proposed um the the risk here is that um the the roles that have been played valuably by the by the district and B representatives are diminished and that’s certainly something that um I don’t think we need we’re we’re very
Proud of our our work in partnership with the BS and districts in the in the floods team um and want to continue that hence the The Proposal that um we reorganize the suffk flood risk partnership which has been very officer focused into having a member representative probably from the um from
The cabinet re relevant Cabinet member from the district council so we’re um set up more like the suffer waste partnership so an officer group and a and a and a members group um with the the decision making members being actively involved in the planning and and um delivery of of that stratey
So there’s there will be continue to be deep involvement from the districts in in our work um and then to allow for um the task and finish groups to work on on those particular um areas of Interest where we have significant flooding problems and we had an example that we
Used um some years ago now where we did this in Loft um where there was a significant flooding issue uh in a particular location we did a task and Vish group it’s very well attended by the public um who had opportun to ask all the relevant people the right
Questions it was you know an really effective bit of scrutiny that came up with recommendations that I’m now pleased to say have been delivered so um so so we’ve got a track record of of successfully doing this and and we should be able to repeat it going forward thank
You Steve do you want to add anything to that yeah uh thank you chair um we’ve spoken at length about the last few months the last five months of continuous Reign has put enormous pressure on Matt and his team to try and deliver what is necessary to not only look at the
Consequences but to mitigate uh future res and find Future resilience to to flooding um it’s only right and proper that the scrutiny committee sit and look at any proposals that the government may be putting in place uh on our responsibilities as a County Council during 2024 um that will put even more pressure
On our resources and it is it I appreciate the fact that we have a very very diligent scrutiny committee that look at the finite issues and deliver their um Rec recommendations and help everyone especially as I said the team thank you thank you thank you for that
I’m going to bring in uh our two members uh councelor Ryan councelor McCraw if you’ve got any comments or questions to ask at this stage thank you chair um I have to say I don’t have a strong opinion about this so um I’m I’m not greatly concerned
About it either way the only concern I do have is that um during the the debate and the questions today there were one or two members here saying well until today or until yesterday I knew nothing about that well I mean as councilors that have sat on that subcommittee we’ve
Known very well about those things for several years now in some detail um so I do worry that there’ll be a loss of knowledge in in the short term how long it will take you to get up to speed on that I don’t know some of the some of
The reports and papers we have really only come around around one every once every two or three years so you know we can probably remember the last time Anglia War here to defend themselves whereas you can’t so that’s the concern I would have okay thank you
For hang on we are still live so you could if you use your microphones I think Sor people can hear what just to correct I don’t think anyone said they hadn’t done anything I think some said that there was their knowledge had been increased there were things they didn’t
Know there’s a big difference between that and not doing anything so I I I objected to that use of words I apologize Chef I said people haven’t done anything so that’s not what I meant to say okay S I think we me we we knew
What you meant I think well some of us knew what you meant so and so thank you for that c mcro do you want to add anything yes chair thank you very much um I must have confessed when I first saw the proposals I thought to myself
That uh we’re here not so much to praise the subcommittee but to bury it uh I regret I really do regret the loss of the district connection as it has existed I can see the Practical difficulties Jessica and I have worked together quite a number of years on this
Um and I don’t think the point was made clearly enough because it’s not a question of um uh people saying that’s the first time I’ve heard of this because I mean might well be it I I’ve reckoned it took me two years to get to grips with any part of flood management
Scrutiny and interestingly today you extended uh your discussion to something we’ve already extended the remit of the subcommittee to consider Water Management because it’s such a major resource it’s now a strategic resource 40% more water required I think I heard a few years ago um over the next 30
Years in East Anglia as a whole um I do have concerns I must be confess that the members familiarity will take some time and I’ve chaired a scrutiny committee many times many years and I’m always aware that the bandwidth the time taken to scrutinize um to bring everybody up
To that speed you meet perhaps once every two months or is it once every month i’ I found I found a shortage of bandwidths on a monthly meeting uh because there was just so much to do however and the only final point I’ll make um is Task and finish groups I’d
Like to be involved I think I still have an interest in the subject I’ve gained an interest over these years um I’m not actually a portfolio holder for environment or housing which is probably the one that would be proposed but I have an interest and and some background
In the subject but I’m a bit concerned you’ve got a task and finish group for a task that seems to me Impossible by definition to finish now I don’t know if Jessica would like to take me up on any of those points yeah Jessica thank you um and and thank you
Thank you um councelor mcro very much I I’m very um sympathetic with with how you feel um I I don’t think this isn’t this change isn’t completely without some drawbacks um but in the balance I I feel that it is absolutely will be better um just for instance today we looked at
Water Resource and water supply that originally was going to be on the agenda of the subcommittee and we felt um you know through conversations that took place with Matt and and Michael that it was of you know a level of importance that it should be um a countywide effort to
Scrutinize it rather than um the subcommittee where at the moment we have I mean we’ve got five members I think and not all of whom always appear so you know it just and and then we’re asking key panel members to come from the environment agency and um other
Organizations and the chances of getting them to come and engage meaningfully are far greater if it’s at a countywide committee rather than what they might perceive wrongly probably as as being a sort of minor committee and I think that that influence and and capacity to to
Bring bring the people we want to the table is is really important um I have some concerns about the workload of the main scrutiny committee um because there are some flood issues that we need to look at that and there’s also a very busy schedule for the main scrutiny committee
So I think that this is going to take some handling I I don’t pretend that it doesn’t and I think the um the task and finish groups terms of how they work you know we’re starting out we so it’s up to all of us to make them
Work well and um you know I think we can do it but it will take a lot of Goodwill and it’ll take a bit of Officer time as well thank you for that I think we’ve heard this morning how big and important this topic is and probably what it was
Can I say 10 years or so and I think it’s right and proper it comes to the full County Council scrutiny committee but obviously we don’t want to lose the contact and there’s no indication will lose contact with the bars and districts and with you two gentlemen and and the
Knowledge and experience that you have so we’re very happy for you to attend that it is a public meeting of course but we’d be very happy to invite you if we’re looking at particularly those issues which you can help us with because uh yes we don’t know everything
Uh and you’ve been involved for a long time so we want to keep those connections as much as we can but we do feel it would give a bigger voice and a stronger voice if it came to the suffer County Council scrutiny committee to look at that so that’s that’s the
Proposal uh I’m going to ask the members have this proposed on page 41 and 42 of their papers and because it’s such an important thing uh I’m going to ask for a vote so I’m going to ask for you to to uh vote those who are in favor of making this uh this
Change yes you can I can no no unfortunately not but but your but we’re amongst friends if you want to put your hands up so any thank you for that anyone against just to record that yes councel scar um that’s carried then thank you very much and we
Look forward to working closely with uh with you in the future i’ got to move on there if I can conscious of time item seven we’ve got information bulletins anything as we know we don’t discuss these but anything on there that you want to uh point out
Because we can put it on our forward work program if there’s anything that concerns you yes councelor bird yes thank you chairman I hope you won’t overall me in on your direction of discussing these obviously there is the one on air travel which I asked to be
Included having seen the figure in in the um in the budget we’ve obviously got the information now 21 a flights in the last available budget year while it could be argued when we in the wide scheme of things if we’ve got 4 and a half thousand staff what’s 21 air flights but
To be honest it’s a message we’re sending to our public you know 21 occasions when officers are traveling by plane on officer I know some of those are towards attending conferences now I’ve always advocated inperson attendance rather than Zoom but if not at the price of traveling by air
Airplane quite frankly I think we need to put some sort of recommendation or message to Senior Management to review that it should be an absolute Last Resort exception when there’s no other option quite frankly it’s s we’ we’ve been talking this morning about the environment and the impact on the
Limited resources and we’ve got officers traveling by airplane I just don’t think it’s acceptable point but just wondering how we can do that um you know um do we want something on our for work program to look at that in more detail or do we just want to record the comments I just
Some some sort of comment or recommendation to Senior Management to review review I don’t want I don’t want to put it on the agenda for a whole topic for us to scrutinize I don’t think it justifies that but just a some sort of message or recommendation to management to the senior management team
To review review the whole thing and and it to be the message that it’s the only when app absolutely necessary where no other option is available as I say half of these trips were to attend conferences well I’m sorry if if it’s if it means traveling by airplane or
Attending by Zoom attend by Zoom okay so the things are not recommendation but we’ll we’ll record the comment and make the comment if that’s okay then yeah great thank you very anything else on any the information bulletins I thought they were all quite interesting ones really I
Think plugin suffk one I thought was very good as well so if there’s nothing else on that we’ll move on to item eight which is really just to confirm our um forward plan forward work program so uh our next meeting is on the 9th of May
We’re looking at the outcomes of the CQC pilot inspection of the council’s care services the one after that is the 4th of July uh we’re looking at the progress of the transformation programs within the County Council and 26th of September we be looking at highways uh and in that
We will be including drainage and flooding of the highways as part of that so we look forward to seeing you again Steve on that one so is that okay anything else you wish to add on forward work program at this stage if not I will just declare
The meeting closed and thank you all very much for your your input and your attendance today thank you need to sign there two lots is