To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what plans he has to amend the Environment Agency's powers to influence planning decisions relating to sites at risk of flooding. (181107)

I have been asked to reply.

There are no proposals to amend the Environment Agency's powers to influence planning decisions on sites at risk of flooding. On 1 October 2006 we made the agency a statutory consultee for development proposals in flood risk areas¹. On 1 January 2007 we introduced a planning direction², which prohibits a local authority from granting permission for major development in a flood risk area, to which the agency maintains an objection, without first sending details to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, to consider whether it should be called-in for decision. We believe that these two measures provide the agency with sufficient powers to influence planning decisions on sites at risk of flooding. We will keep under review how these arrangements are working.

¹ The Town and Country Planning (General Development Procedure) (Amendment) (No.2) (England) Order 2006.

² The Town and Country Planning (Flooding) (England) Direction 2007.