Flooding roles and responsibilities

Understanding the different types of flooding and the associated roles and responsibilities of organisations in managing flood risk can be confusing. Flood risk management is a highly complex sector that includes environmental, engineering, scientific, economic, legal, political and social considerations.

Managing different types of flood risk involves many elements of work including, but not limited to flood forecasting and warnings, flood mapping, asset maintenance, reactive works, emergency planning, flood investigations, flood modelling, design and construction of flood alleviations schemes, highway drainage works, sewerage upgrades, planning developments with consideration for flood risk, etc.

There are several bodies operating within West Berkshire in the delivery of flood risk management. These include risk management authorities, emergency responders and other flood risk partners.

Under the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 (FWMA), West Berkshire Council is designated as a Lead Local Flood Authority and has statutory powers and responsibilities for co-ordinating flood risk management in partnership with other organisations/risk management authorities.

We have provided a breakdown of the roles and responsibilities of different organisations and illustrative examples in the sections below to help members of the public understand who is responsible for what.

For information regarding the legislative background of roles and responsibilities please see our legislation and policy page.

For a more detailed breakdown of the roles and responsibilities of different organisations please see section 4 of the  Local Flood Risk Management Strategy 2022-2027 [4MB] .
 

Summary roles and responsibilities

Risk Management Authorities

Risk Management Authorities (RMA's) have statutory responsibilities to work together in the delivery of flood risk management functions under the Flood and Water Management Act 2010.

Other responsible parties

Please note that West Berkshire does not have Internal Drainage Boards (IDB). Many of the powers that would be under the IDB are transferred to West Berkshire Council as the LLFA/Unitary authority.

To demonstrate how these roles and responsibilities are put into practice, we have provided example illustrations on the pages below:

• surface water drainage in rural areas
• surface water drainage in urban areas

You can also visit our types of flood risk page.

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Risk management authorities and emergency responders

Risk Management Authorities (RMA's), have statutory responsibilities to work together in the delivery of flood risk management functions under the Flood and Water Management Act 2010. Risk management authorities within West Berkshire are:

• the Environment Agency
• West Berkshire Council (acting as Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA), highways authority and unitary authority)
• Thames Water (water and sewerage company)
• National Highways (highways authority for the M4 and A34)

In addition to their roles and responsibilities as RMA's, some authorities also have a statutory duty to plan for emergencies such as floods. Under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, the Environment Agency and West Berkshire Council are classified as Category 1 emergency responders, while National Highways and Thames Water are classified as Category 2 responders. Both Category 1 and Category 2 responders work together within Local Resilience Forums (LRFs). The members of LRFs collaborate to plan and prepare for both localized incidents and large-scale emergencies. These forums enable responders to identify potential risks and develop emergency plans aimed at preventing or reducing the impact of incidents on local communities.

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Flood risk partners

West Berkshire Council also works with the Canal and River Trust, Parish Councils, Riparian landowners, Flood Wardens and Flood Forums to understand the water Environment across the region.

More information regarding our partners can be found in the Local Flood Risk Management Strategy 2022-2027 [4MB] .

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Residents and businesses

Responsibility for protecting individual properties from flooding lies in the first instance with the property owner.

While in some circumstances other organisations or property owners may be liable due to neglect of their own responsibilities, there will be many occasions when flooding occurs despite all parties meeting their responsibilities. It is therefore vitally important that householders and businesses whose homes and premises are at risk of flooding, take the following steps to ensure the impact to your home is reduced:

• check whether your property is at risk of flooding from any sources
• if at risk of flooding, sign up for flood warnings from GOV.UK
• make sure that you are prepared in the event of a flood
• take measures to make sure that the impact of flooding to your property is reduced, either through permanent measures or temporary measures - for information about flood grants, see our flood grants page
• where possible, take out flood insurance

Information on whether households are at risk can be obtained from the Environment Agency and the Local Authority. All households in Flood Zone 2 and 3 (areas at risk from fluvial flooding from a main river) should have been contacted, to notify them of this and, unless they have chosen to opt-out, will receive flood warnings from the Environment Agency when the risk of Main River flooding is high.

You can find information about surface water flood risk from the Environment Agency on GOV.UK.

You can also find information about flood zone allocation on GOV.UK.

The Environment Agency also publish flood risk data in a format that can be downloaded for analysis or combining with other data sources. You can find the Environment Agency data on GOV.UK here.

Visit our 'flooding: be prepared' page for more information on preparing for flooding.

You can find further information regarding flood grants for protecting your property here.

Further information

You can find further information and guidance relating to flooding roles and responsibilities on the websites linked below:

• Environment Agency - National Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Strategy for England
• UK Parliament - 'Who is responsible for managing flood risk? (England)'
• GOV.UK - 'Flood risk management: information for flood risk management authorities, asset owners and local authorities'
• GOV.UK - 'Co-operation and requesting information in flood and coastal erosion risk management Statutory guidance on the implementation of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 Sections 13(1) and 14 in England Presented to Parliament pursuant to Section 13(1) and 14 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010'
• Local Government Association - 'Managing flood risk: roles and responsibilities'