Contaminated Land -State of Local Authority Preparedness

A survey of activity within local authorities in June 1999 showed a highly variable picture across England and Wales with respect to the imminent commencement of their Environmental Protection Act 1990, Part IIA responsibilities. Whilst some had carried out initial reviews of contaminated land in their areas most had taken little or no action. This seems to have been caused to some extent by the repeated start-stop history of the legislation in the years since passage of both the original legislation and the Environment Act 1995 which introduced Part IIA to the Environmental Protection Act 1990. Local authorities seem to be taking a “wait and see” approach, sceptical that it will ever be implemented. The reviews carried out to date rarely seem to be robust enough to comply with impending statutory requirements but do provide a good starting point upon which to build. Of great concern was the lack of identified budget for the anticipated tasks in 60% of the responding local authorities