Flood and Water Management In Scotland Dr Rebecca Wade, UWTC, University of Abertay

Scotland Recent Directions and EU Directives State of the Water Environment Improving the Water Environment Working Together and Making it Work –Acknowledgements to SNIFFER Flood Risk Management Conference 2011, Stuart Greig (Scottish Government), Roy Richardson (SEPA)

Recent Directions and EU Directives EU Water Framework Directive (2000) –Water Environment and Water Services (Scotland) Act (2003) EU Floods Directive (2007) –Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act (2009)

State of the Water Environment Waterbodies in Scotland: –important economic and social asset. –43% of the water bodies in the Scotland river basin district are at risk of being harmed (WFD characterisation) –this compares to over 80% of waters in most of Europe.

River waterbodies in Scotland: –Most of are of good quality: –72% are not affected by pollution –73% are not affected by abstractions or dams –66% are not affected by engineering works –Aiming for 98% of waterbodies reaching good status by 2027

Understanding Flood Risk and Improving the Water Environment –Early 2011, Scottish Government published far reaching guidance on managing flooding sustainably. –Roles and responsibilities, managing flooding across catchments, indicators of sustainability, and benefit- cost analysis –Creating an agreed framework for all parties to take forward flood risk management

The process… Delivering Sustainable Flood Risk Management in Scotland –Consultation process (closed on 18 th March 2011) –Development of Guidance (to be issued in May 2011)

Guidance in 7 parts:

Working Together …and Making it Work Establish National Flood Management Advisory Groups Engage with RBMP advisory groups Take forward a joint communications strategy with responsible bodies

Making it work in practice … Government and regulators now realising the importance of source control and surface water management Pluvial flood events have been severe and urban areas are now a focus ‘SUDS’ is now in the political vocabulary SUDS are seen as one mechanism to help join the Directives – delivering surface water management (FRM) and water quality benefits (WFD)

Making it work in practice – Who does the work? Who has the responsibility? How do the local authorities react to this?

What are the Questions in Scotland now? How do we balance National versus Local issues? Who is responsible for reducing flood risk with regard to land use planning? These Directive overlap - Can we reduce bureaucracy rather than increase it? How do we measure multiple benefits such as water quality and biodiversity? How do SUDS and Cities fit into the bigger picture?

More Questions … We still need to clear up issues of ownership and maintenance of SUDS - What opportunities are there to address SUDS in a more holistic way? –SG Answer: This will be addressed in a new planning advice note, the Scottish Governments preferred option is for Scottish Water or Local Authorities to adopt SUDS… but no timeline for this at present.

In Summary In Scotland we have a high quality water environment We have made good progress with the new Directives SUDS and SWM are a big part of the solution But – there are still a lot of Questions

Thank you – Any more questions?