Agenda and minutes

The Committee observed a moment’s silence in memory of Mr Ken Gregory who had passed away since the previous meeting.  

(1)       Mr Scholey informed the Committee in respect of Minute 11 (8) that Southern Water had agreed to accept responsibility for the SuDS Scheme referred to.

(2)       RESOLVED that subject to an amendment to Minute 11 (7) setting out that the Gold Commander was the Chair of the SCG, the Minutes of the meeting held on 17 July 2017 are correctly recorded and that they be signed by the Chairman.  

(1)       John Byne from the Environment Agency gave a presentation. The accompanying slides are contained within the electronic agenda papers on the KCC website.

(2)       Mr Byne said that the Environment Agency was working on the Medway Estuary and Swale Flood and Coastal Risk Strategy in partnership with their consultants, Mott MacDonald.  

(3)       Mr Byne described the area covered by the Strategy.  It started at Stoke by the Kingsnorth Power Station, went down the Medway to Allington, extending as far east as Graveney Marshes (Cleve Hill). It also covered the Isle of Sheppey.

(4)       Mr Byne then described the three tiers of coastal defence planning.   The EA had published the Shoreline Management Plans by 2010 and was now working on the strategies which would consider the Plans in greater detail, consider whether their policies were still relevant and establish policies for smaller frontages.  The strategies were considering costings for high level options rather than undertaking any scheme design. 

(5)        Mr Byne went on to say that Phase 3 of the Strategy (short list to preferred options) had now been signed off by the Project Board during the summer and Phase 4 had now begun.   The Consultants were now completing the reports in preparation for consultation which was due to commence towards the end of winter 2018. 

 NB: The consultation is now live. The Link is:   https://consult.environment-agency.gov.uk/ksles/medway-estuary-and-swale-strategy/

(6)       Mr Byne turned to the development of the preferred options.   It had taken two years to develop the criteria which would enable the Project to consider the best way to manage the various frontages through the coastal area.   The main priority was to reduce the risk and the threat of coastal flooding and coastal erosion to people and their property.   The second criterion was to deliver the greatest environmental, social and economic benefit. There were a large number of designated areas in the Medway/Swale area which needed to be preserved and protected, including their natural habitats.   The EA had worked closely with Natural England on their Coastal Footpath project.  The third criterion of working with natural processes aimed to ensure that work on coastal flood protection dovetailed with the protection of natural habitats.   The “adapting to future risks” criterion took account of the Strategy’s hundred year duration.  Adaption to phenomena such Climate Change and other factors was therefore crucial.

(7)       The process of identifying options had taken the form of identifying a longlist of options through workshops and other forms of consultation, screening them down in order to create a shortlist of realistic and sensible options for evaluation in greater detail.   These had been evaluated through a number of investigations and reports which paid particular regard to environmental and social aspects as well as costs and benefits.  This process had led to the selection of preferred options. 

(8)       Mr Byne then showed the Committee how the area covered by the Strategy had itself been broken down into 11 Benefit Areas.  The needs of each of these had been considered in great detail.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.

(1)       Stephen Scully (KRF Senior Resilience Officer) asked the Committee to note that Flooding had not been the top priority for the multi-agency emergency planning community since the previous meeting of the Committee.  There had necessarily been a strong concentration on security matters as well as the Grenfell Tower fire response which had involved a great deal of mutual aid support from emergency planners in Kent.  

(2)       Flooding had, however, still been the focus of much local action. Work during the summer had included a flood risk assessment review on all of the county’s multi-agency flood plans, which had resulted in them being updated. KRF had also re-invigorated its humanitarian response, which was a crucial part of its work on flood response.   Work on winter preparedness was also on-going. Press Officers continued to refine protocols for warning and informing and a winter preparedness workshop had also been held for resilience partners.  Advice to businesses was continuing, led by KCC and supported by all the Borough and District Councils.   Further work was taking place on long term risk assessments in relation to climate change. 

(3)       Mr Scully then set out the key activities, which included the attendance by the Duty Emergency Planning Officer at the winter preparedness workshop. The workshop had focused on a number of incident scenarios, enabling partners to learn from one another and share good practice. 

(4)       The Flood Warden workshop had demonstrated the tremendous effort that had taken place since the storms of winter 2013/14. There were now some 200 flood wardens in Kent.   They had asked for a workshop rather than a seminar to facilitate more activity-based training. The feedback from this event had been overwhelmingly positive. 

(5)       Mr Scully then said that Met Office training for resilience partners had been delivered at the Kent Police Training School.    It had been mainly aimed at statutory organisations but had also been made available to the voluntary sector.  This had been very successful and it was planned to hold another one-day session in 2018.  

(6)       The East Coast Flood Group had studied the outcome of Exercise Surge, producing some very strong forward-thinking recommendations.  The next meeting would involve Mr Scully doing a joint presentation with Lincolnshire CC on caravan parks in flood risk areas along the coast. 

(7)       Mr Scully said that the KRF Seminar had concentrated on security, but had nevertheless featured a KRF stand addressing training and exercising, winter preparedness, and the Kent Prepared website.  All the latest information could be found on this website under the “Flood Wardens” heading.

(8)       It had been intended that a Recovery exercise would take place earlier in the year.  It had been re-scheduled for 27 November due to the need to respond to the Grenfell Tower tragedy.   Some of the lessons from Exercise Surge in terms of the consequences of a mass full-scale evacuation recovery operation were still being translated into practice and this process was ongoing. 

(9)       Mr Scully concluded his presentation by referring to two events. These  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18.

(1)       Mr Harwood informed the Committee that there had been 5 additional flood alerts issued by the EA since the publication of the agenda papers. The figures in paragraph 2.5 of the report should therefore read: “21 flood alerts (2 fluvial and 19 coastal.”  There had also been an additional 6^th occasion when the Thames Barrier had been closed (paragraph 2.7). 

(2)       Mr Harwood then said that the key issue was that there had been very little rain since the last meeting of the Committee.  There had been a very dry winter in autumn and winter of 2015/16.   The last 12 months had seen less than half the long term average rainfall total.    

(3)       The key period of activity had been around the autumn equinox where there had been high spring tides and storm activity.   There had been concerns over potential surge situations, but these had not materialised in any significant way except for some minor coastal flooding in the Faversham Creek area and parts of the coastal Isle of Sheppey. 

(4)       Mr Lewin asked what the tests and operational reasons had been for the 6 closures of the Thames Barrier.   Mr Harwood replied that these had mainly been operational, occurring during the 4-6 October period and on the 21^st in response to the EA Flood Alerts issued at those times. In consequence, there had not actually been any need for testing. 

(5)       Mr Lewin then asked what consideration the EA had given to the down-stream effect of the closure of the Thames Barrier and its effect on the Shoreline Management Plan, and whether there was any correlation that needed to be taken into account.

(6)        Mr Byne replied that there was no substantial correlation to be concerned with as the closures did not affect the water levels they the EA was concerned with in the Medway and Swale Estuary area.   There had been a bounce-back effect which had caused minor flooding but this did not extend as far east as the area covered by the Strategy.   The area affected was the the Thames Estuary, which was considered as part of the Thames Estuary 2100 Plan.

(7)       Mrs Prendergast referred to paragraph 2.3 and asked what conditions were imposed in respect of the smaller reservoirs before water companies were permitted to abstract and fill from ordinary watercourses.  

(8)       Mr Tant replied that every reservoir abstraction licence had conditions that were mostly applied in the same way. 

(9)       Mrs Prendergast then said that she represented a constituency where there were a number of small agricultural reservoirs. In one of them, the farmer was able to control the flow in and out of the local stream, which had led to complaints from farmers on lower ground that they had no access to water.   She asked what controls were in place and how they were monitored. 

(10)     Mr Tant said that It was the EA which regulated reservoirs.  The questions raised by Mrs Prendergast would be addressed at the next meeting  ...  view the full minutes text for item 19.

Monday, 5 March 2018

Monday, 16 July 2017

Monday, 12 November 2017

The Committee agreed the following dates for meetings in 2018:-

Monday, 5 March 2018

Monday, 16 July 2018

Monday, 12 November 2018.