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 support local authorities in improving surface water drainage to prevent overloading of combined sewer systems.

The Government is strongly committed to improving the implementation of Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) and ensuring adoption and maintenance arrangements.

New national standards make clear that SuDS should be designed to cope with changing climatic conditions as well as delivering wider water infrastructure benefits in the form of flood prevention and storm overflow reduction, offering reuse opportunities, reducing run off, and helping to improve water quality, amenity, and biodiversity. The standards are a material consideration in deciding planning applications in accordance with paragraphs 181 and 182 of the National Planning Policy Framework.

The Environment Agency has a strategic overview role for all sources of flooding, including surface water; playing an active role in supporting and enabling local authorities to plan and adapt to current and future surface water flood risk.