Episode 24 – Part 2 – What you need to know about the Compliance and Governance of Off-Mains Drainage systems in the UK with James Warren, UKDP

The following transcript is autogenerated so may contain errors.

Matt Nally  

Is it a good idea to start with, I suppose how the regulations have changed recently? Absolutely.

James Warren  

Yep. It’s still at it. So a regulatory reform was made was released and made effective by Defra in January 2015. Covering England, it’s called the small sewage discharge general binding rules a bit of a mouthful. The first issue is that the industry referred to it as a general binding rules that EA refer to it as the SSD. So there’s a there’s a disconnect already, even though it’s only a bit of language difference. But that doesn’t help. It’s been brought in to combat the vast number of septic tanks that have been and still are discharging to a surface water, whether that be a stream, a ditch a river. And it’s a great regulatory reform, it’s been needed for ages, these individual tiny pollutions don’t really get much press. But when you combine the potential hundreds of 1000s of these naughty discharges, it is a major pollution issue for our waterways. So it’s a brilliant regulatory reform. Initially, it came with a five year timeframe to assess and then address any non compliance systems, specifically targeting septic tanks discharge into water causes. But there’s, there’s been a real issue with getting the message to the people that need to know about it. We touched on part one, because there isn’t this database, specifically referencing England. We’ve got this, we’ve had this issue and still have this issue to our day, nearly nine years past this the release of this regulatory reform, where a huge number of property owners still don’t know necessarily what system they have. They certainly don’t know the complexities of what the regulatory reform means, how it applies to them and their system, and certainly what they need to do to bring it up to spec so to speak. So we are in this quite unique situation where companies like mine were empty and companies that suck out the septic tank manufacturers service companies, literally as they stumble upon a non compliant system. They’re making the property owner aware, and then explaining what needs to happen after that. I mean, the reforms are excellent. You can go on to the government website, and it explains what the rules are. It explains what the rules are specifically to any new installation in England after January 2015. And to be fair, you can’t really get it wrong. But the problem we’re seeing firsthand And is that it’s different people are allowing their own interpretation to come into it. And that’s where the lack of police are never going to come on to lack of police isn’t really helping. We somehow need even though we’re almost nine years on to have a real sort of phase two burst of energy to get this message out to the, to the estate agents, surveyors, conveyances, solicitors, every stakeholder that might come into contact with a off mainstream news system, directly or indirectly, loosely or otherwise. So they are aware, the more stakeholders that are aware of what the regulations are, what they mean, how they need to be applied, the the better it will be for these systems to be upgraded. I, I don’t know. I don’t think anyone has the data on what number of these systems have been upgraded. But if it’s, if it’s anywhere near 10%, I’ll be absolutely amazed. And that’s not through anyone being naughty or lazy, is just a lack of general awareness across the people that need to know about this.

Matt Nally 

Who’s responsible them for? I suppose, one coming up with the rules and two, then creating the awareness and then enforcing it?

James Warren  

Well, I suppose Well, the the, the ultimate responsibility is on the property owner or the asset owner, as they’re referred to, it’s their system, it’s their waste, they’re responsible for it. But flip that round to who’s responsible for making them aware. Well, the EAA have released this, you know, as different environmental arm, but without a database. How are they going to do it? Or how could they do it today? It’s an impossibility. Unless you go a little bit quirky, a bit left field and say, well, it’s normally rural and semi rural, let’s go through parish newsletters, let’s, you know, let’s do things locally. I don’t think there’s a budget, I don’t think there’s a budget for this. I don’t think it’s a big enough problem for someone to spend the time to think about how they’re going to get the outbound messages out there. So it really comes down to installation companies, service companies, manufacturers empty and companies to just keep pushing the message home, whenever they stumble across one of these systems, to make the property owner aware. And then point them to the right people, the right regulations that say how they need to put this right, the regulatory reform, you go on the government website, there is a timeframe that says, a fair and reasonable timeframe for upgrading a system that’s been discovered as non compliant is 12 months after discovery. Yeah, but there is no one policing at 12 months, there’s no record where someone that stumbles upon a non compliance system can just tap into a database and say, right then Mrs. Smith at one rose Avenue, whatever it might be, on this specific day, they’ve got noncompliant system. So let’s track it for 12 months and make sure it’s been dealt with. There is none of that. So it’s, it’s all brilliant. It’s 99% Perfect in its in its execution to cover all different systems and all varieties and all variables. But that last 1% of getting the message out there. 

Matt Nally  

That’s been the main problem of interest in and you might not have the answer for this at all. But with the I suppose the increased focus on water companies and the way that they’re discharging mains drainage into rivers and so on, is that created more of an awareness for for automakers? Or is it created a distraction? Neither? Neither, No,

James Warren  

neither, I think if you combined all the non compliance systems that are illegally discharging to surface waters, you could probably equal the volume that a sewage provider discharges on a daily basis. But because we’re talking about individual discharges, where unless you’re a dog walker, and you stumble upon something that doesn’t look quite right, you’re just not going to notice the pollution on a daily basis on a weekly basis or at all. But it’s happening the very fact that this regular regulatory reform has been created tells you there’s a problem a known problem but again, as we refer to in part one, there’s no press around this no one’s shouting and screaming and it it’s almost if something really bad needs to happen before it gets any PR but I don’t think there’s ever going to be a dynamic where something that savagely awful happens we’re talking about these are small sewage discharges so it’s it’s 2000 litres a day to ground if it’s charged into SOCO or under 5000 litres a day going into a watercourse. So you’re only looking at three to four properties so your residential small setups how how bad could they pollute? It’s you know, It can be quite bad in our world on the scale of water companies, it doesn’t touch the sides. So it all comes back to the importance and messaging who’s going to do this? It’s nice that they’ve done all the hard work creating this brilliant document. But not many people know about it. And it? Yeah, it’s just absolutely mind blowing. It really is. It’s baffling. So

Matt Nally 

it sounds like there’s an opportunity there for, as you say, some sort of central database system that that starts to start to track this. So at least in the future, as renewals come through, we can keep track of what might be needed.

James Warren

It’s a bigger picture around the whole concept of making it digital. Yeah, just because these properties are typically very old, and typically in the country, and no one really cares about them. Well, we should care about them. And they are polluting, not all of them. Don’t get me wrong, but they are polluting. And the only way to combat this is to have a central database. So they can be proactively checked, reminders can be sent to the asset owners. And without that is where you know, this, this whole process of upgrading all these non compliance systems could take decades. And originally, it was supposed to just be five years from 2015 to 2020. It’s come and gone, it hasn’t happened. So are they just going to allow it to organically get sorted out over the decades? It? It seems a bit pointless, it’s great that the regulation is in there. It’s great that everyone knows everyone that should know about it doesn’t know about it from my side of the fence installation side, but why should we be looking at decades this should be it should be sorted out. Effective immediately.

Matt Nally 

Yeah, interesting. Okay. So I suppose bringing it back to surveying then surveyors. We discussed I think, before the podcast, the issues around PII. And is that because surveyors don’t necessarily know what the these new rules are, that have come out? And how to identify the problems that you’re mentioning? Yeah. Or is it something else?

James Warren 

I was, some surveyors are completely up to up to date with all the regs like they, they’ve obviously spent so much time researching it. And it’s really impressive that they’re supposed to know every aspect of a property, and yet they’ve spent so much time on drainage and off mains drainage specifically. But yes, the problem comes when perhaps the system has been identified incorrectly, perhaps an assumptions being made, but it’s been written down as an and taken accepted as fact, and then it’s proven to be incorrect. All I’ve seen over the last couple of years specifically is a shift for surveyors to say, it doesn’t seem to be connected to a main sewer system, they then grade the drainage as a red three within their report. So then the onus is then on the purchaser to further investigate that drainage system with a specialist. And to my mind, some people may think is a bit Teflon that’s just diverting the problem, I think that’s the best possible thing to do. With these systems, not only do you need a specialist to come and look at them, you emptied, you need to ascertain what their capacity is, you need to have a look at the structural condition, you need to see if there’s any rainwater cross connections, you need to see where it’s discharging, you need to see how big that soakaway system is it going to cope. And without a specialist company coming in, getting the system empty, then getting all the camera equipment in, no one will ever know. And we do this and sometimes even with all our kit, we struggle to find all the answers, sometimes you need to do exploratory excavations to carry on the investigations. And then the cost could really go up quickly. So from a surveys perspective, when they’re supposed to be looking at every possible part of the building, I think they are doing the correct thing. If they point out that it’s an off mainstream system, and that a specialist company should come in and take a look at it

Matt Nally 

is the fear of saying, you know, speak to a third party, the fact that maybe they feel that they’re doing that a lot throughout the process is in like they might say, you know, we’re not electrical specialists get an electrician and we’re not gas specialists, you know, gas specialists. Is that potentially why people don’t do it? Or is it just awareness again?

James Warren 

You could be right, I mean, I don’t know what a what a purchaser expects a surveyor to do, you know, they can’t possibly be an expert in every single field is you know, it’d be impossible but I don’t know I mean, if you’re looking at electrics or gas or the drainage know that this specialist areas, my expectation is that I’d want a surveyor to give me an overview, and then tell me in their honest, professional opinion, what they feel should happen next. And if they feel there should be three or four different specialists being brought in to look at certain aspects of a property. And that’s fair enough, appreciate the cost goes up, but they are they are protecting their customer at the end of the day, and if they feel something needs to be looked at more closely by an expert, they Then the purchaser is paying that surveyor for their for their expert opinion. If that opinion is bring someone else in, it should be followed, in my opinion. Now I

Matt Nally 

get that I get that. So I suppose the last thing from my perspective on this is, if you’re a surveyor going out on site, you potentially come across what you think is suspect is off mains drainage, or their certifications or accreditations around the systems that you could potentially ask the, you know, the owner for the vendor for to try and help establish,

James Warren

it’s the owner, you would hope would know what’s in the ground, you, you’d hope they’d have some background around it, how much it costs to empty. And if this is your street and plant, how often does it get serviced and who buy you’d expect that as a minimum, and the regulatory reform actually says that that should be provided through the condition of sale. But more times than not, the owner doesn’t know what they have. They don’t know when it was installed, they don’t know where it discharges to. So even if you have a confident, confident vendor saying X, Y and Zed, you got to take it with a pinch of salt, because you don’t know it’s true. Anything, anything after 1983, there was a specific British standard that got introduced and implemented, where there’s a Kitemark on the sewage treatment systems. So anything post 83, you should be able to find this on a system. So at least you know that a certified product that was fine at the time has gone in the ground. But the vast majority of pre 83 old brick and concrete system. So it’s just a case of having a look, make sure it’s structurally sound making making sure it’s sized appropriately, and then doing a tick box exercise after that purpose.