INTERNAL DRAINAGE BOARD MEMBERSHIP AND … · INTERNAL DRAINAGE BOARD MEMBERSHIP AND REPRESENTATION...

ADA for Water Level Management

Member of the European Union of Water Management Associations

Chief Executive: Dr Jean Venables CBE FREng HonDSc MSc CEng CEnv FICE MCIWEM FCGI

Hon Senior Policy Advisor: David Sisson B Eng C Eng MCIWEM

INTERNAL DRAINAGE BOARD MEMBERSHIP AND REPRESENTATION SURVEY ANALYSIS

Project Lead: Branwen Rhead Analysts: Tim Vickers BSc, Ian Moodie MSci

6 Electric Parade, Surbiton, Surrey, KT6 5NT

Telephone +44 (0)20 8399 7350

Fax +44 (0)20 8399 1650 Email [email protected] Website www.ada.org.uk

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.ada.org.uk/





Summary I) Questionnaire responses were received from 80% of IDBs in England.

II) Across all Boards, 63% of members are elected, 36% appointed, and 1% co-opted. The number of

appointed members on larger IDBs is currently limited by the 50%+1 ruling.

III) Very few Boards utilise co-opted members. Across all Boards, only 6 mention having co-opted members.

IV) Boards were requested to state the attendance of appointed and elected members at their previous four

meetings. Average meeting attendance by elected members was 65%, whilst appointed members

attendance was lower at 52%. This lower percentage for appointed members was brought up as a challenge

for many Boards.

V) Boards were invited to comment on any particular challenges they face in seeking sufficient and effective

representation and attendance from local landowners and local authorities. 61 IDBs responded to this part of

the question, of which 36 IDBs responded with concerns relating to local authority representation or

attendance. 26 highlighted difficulties in appointing local authority members as in many cases the local

authority had not elevated a representative. Other concerns related to attendance of the appointed (local

authority) members at meetings and 6 IDBs raised concerns related to the input in meetings by these

members. The responses from the questionnaires collectively made clear the need for local authorities to be

encouraged and supported in appointing specialists or representatives. Many Boards would welcome

support that would help local authorities to consider a wider base for their appointments to IDBs. All 33

Boards administered by the Middle Level Commissioners supported this last point.

VI) Another challenge with regards to representation and attendance on Boards was the issue of ageing

membership and attracting younger people. Some Boards expressed a concern that knowledge was being

lost from Boards as older Board members retired without an opportunity for it to be passed on. One issue

currently preventing younger farmers for example joining may be the perceived lack of time to give to Board

meetings. More broadly, refreshing membership (of which 26% of Boards feel this is an issue) may be due to

lack of incentives. There is currently both a lack of a power to pay members an allowance for attending

meetings and some Boards mention the perception that being a Board member is uninteresting,

unrewarding and time consuming.

VII) With respect to environmental expertise on Boards, 60% of Boards have conservation officers employed

who attend Board meetings when needed to provide specific environmental expertise. 50 Boards also

highlighted Board members with relevant expertise. Of the Boards who responded 89% would consider

making changes to increases environmental representation if needed.

VIII) Currently there is a bare majority rule (50%+1) on local authority membership. The questionnaire asked

whether this rule should be relaxed and whether relaxing the rule could facilitate improved local decision

making by Boards. 69% of Boards were against the bare majority rule being relaxed. The general feeling

behind this opposition was a feeling that changes could remove expertise and experience from the Board by

allowing for increased local authority representation at the expense of elected members.

IX) Boards were asked for support that would be welcomed from ADA, the Government or others. 21 IDBs

requested no particular support other than support and recognition for the duties they are conducting. These

Boards wanted to highlight that they are being run well and that they would appreciate that the Government

recognises that this is the case. If anything these Boards felt that there should be a raised awareness of the

role of IDBs. A further 10 IDBs commented that they would like clear support for the future of IDBs.

X) The questionnaire posed a question to IDBs regarding a change to legislation that would affect election procedures. Currently electors from a district have a differing number of votes depending on the annual value of land they own or occupy. These land values have not been increased in-line with inflation and in





reality it tends towards all land owners and occupiers who pay agricultural drainage rates to the IDB having the maximum of 10 votes anyway. ADA has proposed that future legislation should be simplified so that each landowner gets 1 vote irrespective of annual value. 53% of Boards agreed with the proposed changes to the legislation, 11% stated no and 36% felt were not currently in a position to answer categorically at present.

XI) Boards were invited to comment on any other changes that should be made to election procedures. 43

Boards replied to this question, of which 31 included comments on advertising costs relating to the way

Boards needed to publicise notices. These Boards all stated that the costs of advertising in the local press

were high and that IDBs should be permitted to advertise on their websites. It was suggested that Defra

should look into ways of helping to achieve these modernisations.





Introduction On 19 July 2012, Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Natural Environment, Water and Rural Affairs, Richard Benyon MP, wrote to Internal Drainage Board (IDB) Chairmen inviting input from Boards on a number of issues related to IDB membership and representation. The Minister asked all IDBs to carefully consider their membership arrangements and to work with partners - including e.g. local authorities, conservation and leisure groups:

to ensure that its Board meetings are attended by members and/or conservation officers or advisors with specific environmental expertise relevant to the Board’s work;

to consider what other expertise it would be beneficial for the Board to draw on to enable it to fulfil its wider role in delivering sustainable development (e.g. in the fields of industry, infrastructure, tourism, heritage or recreation – depending on local circumstances and priorities) and include members and/or co-opted officers/advisers with relevant specialist knowledge as appropriate;

to consider whether there are other issues in relation to membership which the Board needs to address to enable it to function effectively and represent local interests, including ensuring that it has sufficient and effective representation and attendance from the local agricultural landowners and local authorities which fund and benefit from its work; and considering representation from Lead Local Flood Authorities;

to consider whether there is action the Board could usefully take to regularly refresh its membership; ensuring membership is dynamic. Thus, maintaining or improving the Board’s long term sustainability by attracting a new generation of members and potential future Chairs.

Defra worked with ADA to develop a questionnaire survey of IDBs in England to collect information to help address the issues highlighted above. The aim of the survey is to help identify existing good practice and any areas of concern for IDBs which Government, working with stakeholders, might be able to help IDBs to address. There were also questions included on potential changes to simplify election procedures for IDBs. The survey questionnaire was sent to IDBs in England in September for completion and return to Defra by 30 November 2012. All averages quoted in this report are mean averages unless stated otherwise.





Analysis Response There were 119 IDBs in England during the survey period. Of these, 96 IDBs (80.7%) submitted responses to the survey, all but one (Strine IDB who submitted a written response) used the questionnaire provided. ADA has fitted the response from Strine IDB to the questions within the survey, in order to complete the following analysis. 1. Composition The IDBs who responded had an average of 18.7 members, with an average of 11.8 elected members, and 6.8 appointed members. Only six IDBs had co-opted members, of these only one (Strine IDB, 2 co-opted members) had more than one co-opted member. The 5 largest Boards by Board membership are shown in figure 2. Figure 2: Board Membership of the 5 largest Boards

Internal Drainage Board

Total members

Elected members

Appointed members

Co-opted members

Axe Brue 57 28 29 0

Parrett 47 23 24 0

Ouse and Derwent 45 22 23 0

Broads (2006) 39 19 20 0

Haddenham Level Commissioners

35 33 2 0

The 4 largest IDBs by Board membership are all IDBs that have resulted from amalgamations since 2000. Haddenham Drainage Commissioners had the largest number of elected members (33), and very few appointed members (2). The Commissioners were formed by an Act of Parliament in 1726, updated 1797 and as such their governing legislation predates the Land Drainage Act 1930. In accordance with their constitution as Commissioners, any land owner with a land holding of greater than a specified value within the Internal Drainage District may become a member of the Drainage Commissioners (the Board). Many of the largest IDBs by Board membership had an appointed membership limited by the 50%+1 rule as per Land Drainage Act 1991, Schedule 1, Section 6 (2). The smallest IDBs served primarily agricultural districts with very few/ no appointed members. See figure 3. Figure 3: Board Membership of the smallest IDBs


Total members

Elected members

Appointed members

Co-opted members

Goole Fields 5 5 0 0

Northworld 5 5 0 0

Muston & Yedingham 6 5 1 0

Feldale 7 6 1 0

Stringside 7 5 1 1

Elected Members

Appointed Members

Co-opted Members

Figure 1: Composition of Elected, Appointed and Co-opted Members across all Boards





2. Representation and Attendance

Boards were requested to state the attendance of appointed and elected members at their previous four

meetings. Of the Boards who responded, average meeting attendance by elected members was 65%, whilst

appointed members attendance was lower at 52%, see Figure 4.

Figure 4: Average attendance of elected and appointed members across all Boards at meetings

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Elected members Appointed members

Asked whether they felt that their Board had sufficient and effective representation and attendance, 96% of

IDBs were satisfied with elected member representation, and 78% of IDBs with appointed member

representation.

Sufficient representation and attendance:

Local Landowners (elected members) - 96% Yes (91), 4% No (4)

Local Authorities (appointed members) - 78% Yes (69), 22% No (20)

Boards were invited to comment on any particular challenges they face in seeking sufficient and effective representation and attendance from local landowners and local authorities. 61 IDBs responded to this part of the question. The chart below (figure 5) summarises those issues highlighted by multiple IDBs.





Figure 5: Challenges in seeking sufficient representation and attendance

2

3

4

4

6

15

26

0 10 20

Need for more local engagement

Lack of representation for key beneficaries

Poor attendance by appointed members

Reducing Environment Agency maintenance

Input provided by appointed members

Ageing membership/attracting younger generations

Failure by Local Authority to appoint members

Number of IDBs

Appointed member issues 36 IDBs responded with concerns relating to local authority representation or attendance. Of these, 26 IDBs highlighted difficulties in Special Levy Paying Local Authorities appointing members, in some cases this was because the Councillors of the Special Levy Paying Local Authority had not elected a representative. 4 IDBs felt that whilst Local Authorities had sufficiently appointed members to their Board, the attendance of appointed members was not adequate. One IDB highlighted that the relatively small sums of special levy that some Local Authorities pay made it more difficult to get engagement and appoint members. 6 IDBs highlighted concerns relating to the input in meetings by appointed members. These covered a range of issues:

Appointed members representing the interests of the local authority itself over the interests of the urban communities served by the IDB, for which appointed members are appointed to represent

Appointed members only contributing to debate on very local issues in meetings and not issues affecting the wider drainage district.

Appointed members’ lack of understanding of development issues/pressures and their impact on the drainage of the district.

Elected member issues IDBs were generally content with their existing elected Board membership. However, 15 IDBs highlighted a concern that IDBs needed to start to attract a younger generation of farmers to stand to be on Boards. Some expressed a concern that knowledge was being lost from Boards as older Board members retired without an opportunity for it to be passed on.

“East Riding of Yorkshire Council (ERYC) was unable to provide the newly amalgamated Board with 12 appointed members from their cohort of councillors. After discussions and agreement between the Board and ERYC it was agreed that persons with specialist knowledge or relevant stakeholder interest should fill these vacancies. The appointee vacancies are now drawn from local business, Parish Councils and conservation groups/Wildlife Trusts who have interests within the Internal Drainage District. The Board proposed that local authority officers with the appropriate skillsets (planning, flood management, etc) should also be considered. This was welcomed by ERYC officers; however ERYC Democratic Services did not support this proposal as it was contrary to their current policy.”

Ouse & Humber Drainage Board

“The quality of landowner representation on the Board is generally very high. Some board members have served for a long period of time and have developed an invaluable level of expertise which is effectively given for free. These people are passionate about ensuring the drainage system works properly at minimal cost within their area but are usually poor at taking any credit for the contribution they make. For as long as IDB work is done properly, few people are even aware that it is being done at all. This makes it much more difficult to recruit new blood to the Board.”

Waveney, Lower Yare and Lothingland IDB





General membership issues

4 IDBs expressed concern regarding general feelings of frustration and disempowerment amongst Board Members. These stemmed from the dependence of these IDBs’ drainage networks upon the Environment Agency’s maintenance of main rivers and coastal defences, which in their view was not being completed effectively. The 4 IDBs felt that they were increasingly unable to fulfil their statutory function, de-motivating and disempowering both elected and appointed members. 3 IDBs highlighted a need to increase the profile of boards to all stakeholder groups in order to encourage local engagement. 3 Boards felt they lacked representation from across a broad spectrum of beneficiaries – e.g. industry, tourism, infrastructure/services. 3. Appointed Members Across the IDBs who responded the majority of appointed members were councillors (77%). There were very few Boards where councils had appointed council officers onto Boards. Across all Boards 4% of appointed members are council officers. Doncaster East IDB had two appointed members from Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council: a Senior Highways Officer and the officer responsible for drainage. The remaining 19% of appointed members across Boards are other appointments (i.e. not councillors or officers). The most common categorical reasoning for other appointments was broadly speaking environmental (14), followed by industry (11), infrastructure (6), recreation (4). Other reasons for membership included representation from the LLFA, financial and business expertise, RSPB representation, tourism and heritage representation. 4. Co-opted Members Only six IDBs had co-opted members, of these only one (Strine IDB, 2 co-opted members) had more than one co-opted member. Most of the Boards with co-opted members had members co-opted for conservation inputs (5). Figure 6: Boards with co-opted members and reasons for co-option:


Reason for co-option Category

River Stour IDB Natural England co-opted member provides advice on conservation and environmental matters.

Conservation

Woodwalton Drainage Commissioners

Reserve manager invited for technical input.

Conservation, technical expertise

Southery & District FWAG Conservation

Stringside Norfolk Wildlife Trust Conservation

Strine One representative of the Local Parish Council. One former farmer/land owner with expertise in local land drainage

Conservation, technical expertise, Parish Council

Buckingham and River Ouzel

Industry, infrastructure

5. Environmental Representation Of the Boards who responded 60% (58) had conservation officers employed who attend Board meetings when needed to provide specific environmental expertise. Boards described means by which they accessed environmental expertise, other than via conservation officers:





50 Boards highlighted Board members with relevant expertise. Expertise mentioned included: elected members participating in stewardship schemes (e.g. HLS/ELS/ESA), or with the local Wildlife Trust, or having land within a designated site (e.g. SSSI/Ramsar/SPA). Where IDBs had land owned by RSPB, local Wildlife Trust, National Trust, Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust, these bodies had members on the Board. Environmental Committees 8 Boards highlighted in their responses that they had a conservation committee. These committees monitor the delivery of the Board’s maintenance programme to ensure compliance with environmental legislation, review environmental policies and risk assessments, and explore opportunities of acquiring grant for environmental stewardship. These committees often had a wide range of co-opted members.

“The Board has a separate Conservation Committee which comprises of 10 members of the Board and 10 members from relevant Conservation Groups from within the Board’s area (Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust, RSPB, Heritage Lincolnshire, Society for Lincolnshire History & Archaeology, Local Bat Group etc). The Committee has been running for the past 12 years and has proved extremely successful. The Board also has one member with considerable environmental experience who produces environmental reports for presentation at Board Meeting. There are also several members with experience through high level stewardship and other environmental schemes. The Board also works in partnership with several local nature groups in various environmental schemes. Consultants are employed if the Board does not have the relevant skills for a particular project.”

Welland & Deepings IDB

The 33 Boards administered by the Middle Level Commissioners highlighted a periodic newsletter produced by their Conservation Officer updating members on conservation issues and work. Of the Boards who responded 89% (85) would consider making changes to increases environmental representation if needed. Describing the approaches boards could take to seek further environmental expertise, Boards suggested the following:

co-opt members onto Board with relevant experience: 18

employ environmental consultant as required: 16

employ Environmental Officer: 11

local authority to appoint a person with environmental interests: 5

existing Environmental Officer to attend Board meetings: 2 Eleven Boards (11%) would not consider increasing their environmental representation. Most of these Boards felt that they currently had sufficient access to environmental expertise under existing arrangements. Only one of the eleven, Rea IDB responded that they did not have access to conservation expertise. 6. Other Representation Having been asked whether any other expertise would be beneficial for the Board to draw upon to enable it to fulfil its wider role in delivering sustainable development, 89 of the Boards provided responses which offered suggestions of beneficial expertise in the following categories (figure 7):





Figure 8: Activity by Boards to attract new membership

Figure 7: Other beneficial expertise for Boards to fulfil role delivering sustainable development With regards to access to this additional expertise, 94% of the Boards stated that they already have access to some of this expertise. 7. Local Authorities and the Bare Majority Rule Currently there is a bare majority rule (50%+1) on local authority membership. The questionnaire asked whether this rule should be relaxed and whether relaxing the rule could facilitate improved local decision making by Boards. 69% of Boards were against the bare majority rule being relaxed. The general feeling behind this opposition was a feeling that changes could remove expertise and experience from the board by allowing for increased local authority representation at the expense of elected members. A further question with regards to local authority representation asked whether there should be representation from Lead Local Flood Authorities (LLFAs) on Boards. 67% stated yes and only 27% no. Of the responders that stated that there should not be LLFA representation, a number challenged whether they would have both local knowledge and interest which would be of use to the Board. Others stated that there may be difficulties in achieving representation from LLFAs (this is a minority in comparison with all responders, including those that stated yes). 8. Refreshing Membership

In order to attract new membership to Boards 53% currently circulate a newsletter to rate payers and 64% currently provide notifications of elections and opportunities to stand in rate requests or on their websites. The questionnaire established that a further 34% would aim to circulate newsletters in the future and 28% would aim to provide notifications in rate requests or on their website. See Figure 8: 26% of Boards feel that there are barriers to refreshing membership. One area to address is the lack of younger members. Several Boards believe for example that younger farmers have less time to give to

0 20 40 60 80 100

Notify via website

Notify via newsletter

Percentage of Boards

Currently

In Future





“The Drainage District should be completely re-valued, to ensure that the arising entitlements to appoint members accurately reflect the current position, rather than the position that existed over 20 years ago. IDBs should be able to introduce a system of substitute members, much as Local Authorities are able to.”

Water Management Alliance

Board meetings. A further issue highlighted was lack of incentives to become Board members. Both lack of a power to pay members an allowance for attending meetings and even the perception that being a Board member is uninteresting, unrewarding and time consuming, are issues highlighted which may prevent the refreshing of membership. 9. Support IDBs would welcome from ADA, the Government or others 21 IDBs requested no particular support other than support and recognition for the duties they are conducting. These Boards wanted to highlight that they are being run well and that they would appreciate that the Government recognises that this is the case. If anything these Boards felt that there should be a raised awareness of the role of IDBs. A further 10 IDBs commented that they would like clear support for the future of IDBs. Several Boards also commented on the need for Government to be convinced that grant aid for the work of IDBs is vital and that many areas where IDBs operate are under threat due to a lack of investment in recent years. This question provided another opportunity to raise concerns associated with local authorities and their appointments on IDBs. The 33 Boards administered by the Middle Level Commissioners would welcome support that would help local authorities to consider a wider base for their appointments to IDBs, appreciating the fundamental importance of members with local knowledge. In addition to this issue, a further 9 Boards suggested the need for help to improve support from their local district council. Several Boards commented on the need to encourage councils to appoint appropriate people who are willing to commit to the important position that they take up. Council’s need to be encouraged also to appoint specialists or representatives that can give a broader view of the council’s/Board’s area. Another issue highlighted in the responses related to regulations and processes associated with this. 5 Boards recognised the importance of reducing the burden of unnecessary regulation and the need to help achieve greater simplicity and cost-effectiveness in related processes. This ties in with requirements in the Land Drainage Act which state the need for the advertisement of notices relating to certain items such as byelaws, drainage rate orders, schemes, elections (see 11) etc to be publicised in newspapers. A number of Boards recognised the importance of continuing support from ADA, and the research and guidance provided on industry-wide issues. 10. Other issues relating to Membership and Representation This section gave an opportunity for IDBs to comment on any other issues relating to membership and representation that need to be addressed and support which Boards might require to attend to these issues. This gave opportunity for some Boards to reiterate issues already brought up such as criticism of appointed members who fail to attend meetings sparking several Boards to suggest for a provision that could remove such members, considering ways of getting more people to volunteer to be on Boards, ensuring membership includes expertise in land management as well as representation of local interests, and ways of modernising election procedures and reducing costs of advertising (see remarks in 10 and 11). In relation to this last point, it was suggested that Defra should look into ways of helping to achieve these modernisations. A new point raised by 5 Boards concerned the introduction of a system of substitute members. To enable this it was suggested that Defra would need to support this and introduce changes in legislation to bring in such as system. Another issue raised by 5 Boards concerned drainage district values and the fact that these have not been increased since 1991 in line with inflation. As also mentioned in 11, electors votes are currently proportioned depending on the annual value of land that they own or occupy. These land values are not up to date and so there may be need to revalue the drainage district so that arising entitlements to appoint members accurately reflect the current values.





11. Simplification of Election Procedures The questionnaire posed a question to IDBs regarding a change to legislation that would affect election procedures. As alluded to above, currently electors from a District have a differing number of votes depending on the annual value of land they own or occupy. These amounts have not been increased in-line with inflation and in reality it tends towards all land owners and occupiers who pay agricultural drainage rates to the IDB having the maximum of 10 votes anyway. ADA has proposed that future legislation should be simplified so that each landowner gets 1 vote irrespective of annual value. 53% of Boards agreed with the proposed changes to the legislation and 11% stated no. In addition to this however, the remaining 36% of Boards felt they were not currently in a position to answer categorically at present. Some concerns were pointed out regarding the 1 vote for all proposition including that there could still be disproportionate influence from those representing smaller areas both geographically and in value. Conversely, one Board felt that it could result in a more balanced and equitable membership profile. Two Boards considered that the procedure may become more manageable with this proposed change. A further concern raised by 16 Boards was that there could possibly be an increase in the number of elections and this would be costly to the Board. In addition to inviting responses on ADA’s proposed change to legislation, Boards were invited to comment on any other changes that should be made to election procedures. 43 Boards replied to this question, of which 31 included comments on advertising costs relating to the way Boards needed to publicise notices. These Boards all stated that the costs of advertising in the Local Press were high and that IDBs should be permitted to advertise on their websites. A further 9 responses simply referred to modernising and simplifying processes as well as the use of modern communications such as websites. Additional responses included 5 Boards stating that electors should not be compelled to have their votes witnessed by a third party.





Concluding remarks The strong response rate of 80% to this survey indicates that the results are a good reflection of the overall status of all Internal Drainage Boards in England. Conducting the questionnaire has been useful in investigating and assessing what the key issues are in relation to Board membership and representation. In going forwards, the analysis may be beneficial in prompting engagement with certain issues including:

Attendance at meetings and representation on Boards of local authority (appointed) members. The responses from the questionnaires have collectively made clear the need for local authorities to be encouraged and supported in appointing specialists or representatives. Many Boards would welcome support that would help local authorities to consider a wider base for their appointments to IDBs.

There is a need to focus on the issue of ageing membership and in turn find ways of attracting younger members.

Currently a majority of 69% are in favour of keeping bare majority rule. In keeping with this finding, the rule should be kept in place.

ADA’s proposed changes to election procedures with regards to a simplification so each landowner gets one vote needs greater explanation. A large proportion of Boards (36%) are not sure what this change would really mean and in order to make a decision, need greater clarity explaining both the current situation and change proposed.

A very significant proportion of Boards stated the costs of advertising in the local press was high and that IDBs should be permitted to advertise on their websites. Since the conduction of the survey, Defra have launched a consultation addressing these issues (Streamlining procedures in the Land Drainage Act 1991). ADA has submitted a response to the consultation in support of the proposed changes.

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