Flood Forum for residents 17th May 2017
Agenda 6.30 Panel Event in Committee Room 5: 1. Welcome by Councillor Jonathan Bianco 2. Terms of Reference and Agenda for the Evening 3. Introducing the Panel 4. Question Time 5. Summing Up 7.00 Drop-in Session in Committee Room 6 In attendance, will be representatives from : Affinity Water, Thames Water Environment Agency Flood Protection Company London Fire Brigade Council Officers working in: Emergency Response, Green Spaces, Highways and Flood and Water Management. 9.00 Session Ends
Introduction Chair : Councillor Jonathan Bianco, Cabinet Member for Finance, Property and Business Services and Portfolio Holder for Flooding and Water Management. Housekeeping - Fire Drills, Exits, Tea and Coffee provided at the back of this room Sign in and Terms of Reference ● Officers have drawn together 10 questions from over 60 received, which broadly: ○ Represent concerns from residents across the Borough, and represent a number of similar questions ○ Do not lead to duplication nor require answers from an officer or organisation not represented on the Panel. ○ Cllr Bianco will pose the question to the Panel on behalf of residents. ○ There will be no follow up questions during the Q&A panel session, but attendees are asked to raise these in the 1 to 1 conversations taking place afterwards at the drop-in surgery. ● Government guidance for events held in Purdah ○ There are some limits to the questions that can be answered in order that we could continue with this event. ○ The Council have written to candidates to be MP’s to ask them not to attend ○ The Environment Agency cannot answer any questions about funding, work that requires extra funding or Environment Agency resources in general.
Thursday 23 June 2016“Referendum Day” Heavy rainfall fell, from 5pm until 6pm resulting in immediate ponding on roads, and an overwhelming of gullies and sewers. Then, and through the evening, rivers burst their banks. Impact was widespread across the (mainly) north of the borough, at this point 82 properties and commercial premises flooded internally in over 43 locations and strategic infrastructure affected, as well as hundreds of roads. The Council thanks all those residents who have also contributed to allow a clearer understanding of the impact. The Council has also collated information across internal departments and made requests of external bodies. The Flood Investigation is still in draft form and this event will go through what happened and help feed into the final version to be published in June. This process has identified some action already taken and the priorities to invest future resources on.
Introducing the Panel ● Environment Agency - Lee James - Flood and Coastal Risk Management Team Leader Affinity - Patrick Campbell - Network Asset Strategy Manager ● ● Thames Water - Graeme Kasselman North London Infrastructure Planning Manager and Anne Christie Area Performance Manager ● London Borough of Hillingdon ○ Chris Mansfield- Deputy Director Planning, Transportation & Community Projects ○ Highways Service - Dalton Cenac - Highways Maintenance Manager Emergency Management - Mark Wolski - Emergency Manager ○ Green Spaces - Stuart Hunt - Green Spaces Service Manager ○ ○ Planning Specialists - Vicky Boorman - Flood and Water Management Officer
Question 1 Roles and Responsibilities “Following the flooding in Ruislip in June 2016, residents sought answers to questions mainly around which agency or organisation has specific responsibility for mitigation measures that ought to have been or should now be in place. To an extent they have been given conflicting or contrasting information and the impression has been given to both Residents and Cllrs that no one agency with capability is taking Responsibility. Please give a definitive answer to this with details of who is to be contacted”. Cllr John Riley, asking on behalf of residents in his ward Answers from: 1. Environment Agency - Flood and Coastal Risk Management Team Leader- Lee James 2. London Borough of Hillingdon - Flood and Water Management Officer - Vicky Boorman 3. Thames Water - Graeme Kasselman North London Infrastructure Planning Manager 1 Environment Agency response: The Environment Agency supervises and works with other organisations to manage the risk of flooding in England. We have a number of responsibilities relating to the management of flood risk on main rivers. We provide and operate flood warning systems, have powers to undertake maintenance and other works to manage flood risk on main rivers, issue permits for works on or near main rivers and advise planning authorities on the implications of development proposals on flood risk. Our powers in relation to main rivers allow us to do work to manage flood risk. However, this does not mean that we have to maintain or construct new works. We have to prioritise our work based on risk. See next slide for responses from LBH and Thames Water
Question 1 Roles and Responsibilities 2 London Borough of Hillingdon Flood and Water Management Officer: The Flood and Water Management Act 2010 introduced new responsibilities to different bodies in order to help try and clarify who was responsible for different issues. LBH in its role as Lead Local Flood Authority was given the lead for managing flooding from surface water, groundwater and from ordinary watercourses. It is also required to investigate those sources of flood risk. However there are still lots of organisations involved who have different responsibilities in managing parts of the drainage system. It is often not clear initially during an event who is the responsible party, and you may have to report issues to a number of organisations as they are all responsible for different parts of the drainage system. Ie the Council the gullies, Thames Water the sewers and landowners the rivers. It was clear that water had come out of the culvert underneath Parkwood and Broadwood avenue. Based on information that Thames Water had provided to residents and the Council, Thames Water had acknowledged responsibility the culvert underneath Broadwood and Park Avenue. Therefore in addition to reporting it to the Council, residents were encouraged to report it to Thames Water.
It takes time to collate the information, and following receiving reports the Council in October interviewed a number of residents to establish what had happened and to whom and at what times. 3 Thames Water: Water and Sewerage Companies (WASC) are the statutory undertakers for public sewers. We are therefore involved in all aspects of flow entering and exiting these systems. We do not have a legal responsibility for sewer flooding as there are too many factors outside of our control that can cause flooding. We request all of our customers to contact us when they experience sewer flooding. That gives us the opportunity to better understand why the flooding occurred and depending on those findings implement various different interventions that may reduce or removal the risk of flooding. It also allows us to keep a register of sewer flooding which drives our flood alleviation capital investment programme. Our surface water influence is for rainfall that lands on buildings and associated hard standings that connects into the public surface water sewer. We hold no influence over highway flooding even if the highway gullies connect into the public sewer and the sewer is full which prevents them from draining the highway. Flow exiting the public sewer and entering the highway does concern us. Similarly we are not responsible for land drainage (i.e. rainfall that does not land on buildings).
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