Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many standalone water discharge permits have been issued in (a) Fylde constituency and (b) England in each of the last five years.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The Environment Agency has issued the following number of water discharge activity permits (formerly known as discharge consents) in the last five years in:
Fylde constituency
Year | Water discharge activity permits |
2013 | 1 |
2014 | 0 |
2015 | 0 |
2016 | 4 |
2017 (year to date) | 2 |
England
(This includes both water discharge and groundwater permits as the number of permits issued are not separately recorded for England as a whole)
Year | Water discharge activity and groundwater activity permits |
2013 | 724 |
2014 | 703 |
2015 | 624 |
2016 | 832 |
2017 (year to date) | 755 |
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of public spending on flood prevention in (a) Fylde constituency and (b) the UK in each of the (i) next and (ii) last five years.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The table below summarises Government investment (Flood Defence Grant in Aid or FDGiA) to flood and coastal risk management schemes in the Fylde constituency and England between April 2012 and March 2021.
Year | Fylde FDGiA (£k) | England FDGiA (£m) |
2012/13 | 210 | 269 |
2013/14 | 595 | 315 |
2014/15 | 112 | 479 |
2015/16 | 0 | 403 |
2016/17 | 657 | 447 |
2017/18 | 15,100 | 413 |
2018/19 | 6,317 | 450 |
2019/20 | 84 | 490 |
2020/21 | 79 | 459 |
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to prevent coastal flooding in Lancashire.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
Between April 2015 and March 2021, the Government plans to invest approximately £120 million on coast protection schemes in Lancashire. The Environment Agency is currently working in close partnership with a number of the Lancashire Coast Protection Authorities in delivering this ambitious capital investment programme to better protect 26,000 properties. This includes:
The Environment Agency, Coast Protection Authorities and third party owners also carry out ongoing routine annual revenue maintenance works for their respective assets.
The Environment Agency also issues flood warnings to vulnerable communities on the coast when weather and tidal conditions have the potential to cause flooding.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many staff were employed by the Environment Agency in (a) Cumbria and (b) Lancashire in each year since 1 January 2012.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The table below provides details of Full time equivalent (FTE) employee numbers in the Cumbria and Lancashire Area of the Environment Agency for each financial year from 2011/12 to 2016/17.
The Environment Agency does not maintain separate records of employees in Cumbria and employees in Lancashire as they operate as one combined Area.
Year | Payroll employees |
FTE | |
31 March 2012 | 373 |
31 March 2013 | 377 |
31 March 2014 | 404 |
31 March 2015 | 370 |
31 March 2016 | 365 |
31 March 2017 | 389 |
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment the Environment Agency has made of the effect of new housing developments on the risk of flooding in Fylde constituency.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The local planning authority consults the Environment Agency on planning applications for developments located within Flood Zone 3, an area having a high probability of flooding. Developers of land in Flood Zone 3 must submit a Flood Risk Assessment (FRA) with their planning application. The Environment Agency reviews the FRAs, assessing the impact of the development on flood risk. FRAs are used to demonstrate that developments will not be at an unacceptable risk of flooding or increase flood risk elsewhere. If the FRA cannot demonstrate this, the Environment Agency will object to the planning application until a satisfactory FRA has been submitted.
The final decision on whether or not to grant planning permission is made by the local planning authority.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many unannounced onsite inspections the Environment Agency has conducted at Cuadrilla Resources’ shale gas site at Preston New Road since July 2017.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
There have been two unannounced visits to Cuadrilla Resources’ shale gas site at Preston New Road since July 2017.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many onsite inspections the Environment Agency has conducted at Cuadrilla Resources’ shale gas site at Preston New Road since July 2017
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
There have been ten visits to Cuadrilla Resources’ shale gas site at Preston New Road since July 2017.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps the Environment Agency is taking to prevent illegal angling in Lancashire.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The Environment Agency’s Fisheries Operations Team uses an intelligence based approach as part of its enforcement plan to target fisheries for rod-licence enforcement. They target waters which have known high evasion rates and busy waters where lots of anglers will see officers enforcing rod-licence compliance. 1,535 rod-licences have been checked this year in Lancashire and 56 anglers have been reported for offences. The detected evasion rate is 3.52%.
Officers regularly meet with the Police to discuss rod-licence and other fisheries offences, as well as providing training for their officers. They also work with the Angling Trust Voluntary Bailiffs to target rod-licence evasion and other fisheries offences, through provision of information to us. This year the Environment Agency worked in partnership with the Angling Trust and Lancashire and Cumbria Police on Operation Clampdown which targeted illegal close season fishing.
The Environment Agency also checks for byelaw compliance to ensure that other elements are correct, such as fishing methods and close seasons. This year they were pleased to find only two offences during the coarse fish close season from 23 patrols undertaken.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment the Environment Agency has made of the level of compliance with relevant environmental restrictions by Cuadrilla Resources’ at its shale gas site at Preston New Road.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
The Environment Agency assesses that to date Cuadrilla have been in general compliant with their permit conditions.
The Environment Agency expects full compliance against Environmental Permits but it is not uncommon for industrial sites to have minor non compliances after site inspections and audits.
The Environment Agency has raised concerns over the management of surface water on site and has asked the operator to address this as a matter of priority.
Asked by: Mark Menzies (Independent - Fylde)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment his Department has made of fish stocks in the River Wyre.
Answered by George Eustice
To assess the health of salmon rivers in England, the Environment Agency carries out annual assessments against salmon stock targets using angler rod catch data. In recent years there has been a downward trend in the health of Atlantic salmon on the River Wyre and our projections suggest this trend will likely continue. Regrettably this is in line with many other Atlantic salmon rivers in the UK and we are seeing sustainable salmon stocks fall across the country over recent years. In response, the Environment Agency and its partners launched in 2015 the Salmon 5 Point Approach.
The most recent assessment (2016) placed the River Wyre in the ‘at risk’ category, and a 5 year prediction of the same category it may be necessary to impose some form of fishery regulation. The Environment Agency undertakes juvenile fish monitoring in the River Wyre. In 2016 a total of 15 sites were surveyed throughout the catchment. The majority of the sites were monitoring juvenile salmonids, while those in the lower part of the catchment monitor the coarse fish populations. The results indicate that the salmon and trout are still present in the upper parts of the catchment in average populations. A mixture of coarse fish were found in the lower half of the catchment in average populations.