The Water Resources (Environmental Impact Assessment) (England and Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2006

Prospective

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the Water Resources (Environmental Impact Assessment) (England and Wales) Regulations 2003 (S.I. 2003/164) (“the principal Regulations”), which extend to England and Wales.

These Regulations implement the amendments to Council Directive 85/337/EEC on the assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment (OJ No L175, 5.7.1985, p.40) made by Article 3 of Directive 2003/35/EC of the European Parliament and the Council providing for public participation in respect of the drawing up of certain plans and programmes relating to the environment and amending with regard to public participation and access to justice Council Directives 85/337/EEC and 96/61/EC (OJ No L156, 25.6.2003, p.17). The principal Regulations implement Council Directive 85/337/EEC in relation to water management projects for agriculture in England and Wales. Water-management projects for agriculture are projects listed in Annex II to Council Directive 85/337/EC as projects to be made subject to an assessment where Member States consider that their characteristics so require: see Article 5 of that Directive.

Regulation 2(3) amends regulation 3 of the principal Regulations so as to provide that projects involving abstraction of water will only fall within the scope of the Regulations where the abstraction is one which requires a licence under the Water Resources Act 1991 (c. 57). This is currently where the amount abstracted in any 24 hours in aggregate exceeds 20 cubic metres.

Notices publicising an environmental statement and further information must be published by the Environment Agency on its website. Publication in the London Gazette is no longer required. The notice must specify any other arrangements that have been made for informing the public of an application under the principal Regulations; and the Environment Agency must also make available to the public other information which only becomes available to it after it has published the notice (regulation 2(5), which substitutes a new regulation 7 into the principal Regulations).

The Environment Agency is required to publish, with a notice of its decision on the application, information regarding the public participation process that has taken place, any right to challenge the decision and the procedures for doing so (regulation 2(6)).

A full Regulatory Impact Assessment and a Transposition Note have been prepared in connection with the amendments made by these Regulations and placed in the library of each House of Parliament. Copies can be obtained from the Water Supply and Regulation Division, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, 55 Whitehall, c/o 3-8 Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HH.