A local activist has 'gone to the top' in his efforts to alert the authorities over what he claims are under reporting of flooding issues in the Burscough area.

Gavin Rattray of the Burscough Flooding Group was one of around 60 folk attending a special meeting called by MP Rosie Cooper at Aughton Christ Church Ministry Centre on Friday with Rattray taking his opportunity to raise his concerns with the chair of OFWAT, Cathryn Ross

QLocal has been sent this copy of his letter:

'Dear Cathryn Ross

Thank you for attending the meeting in Aughton on the 3rd November and giving residents like myself an opportunity to speak to OFWAT.

As promised here is the evidence that there is under-recording of sewer flooding by United Utilities:

*A comparison of the information taken from the flood registers with the information obtained from residents by Burscough Flooding Group. (submitted was the final page of Burscough Flooding Spreadsheet (September 2017) as a pdf.

*UU’s telephone operators were sent home and a telephone answer phone message put in place during and after the Boxing Day 2015 flood. From Steve Mogford UU Chief Executive: “I can confirm that the pre-recorded message was in place from Boxing Day for over a week. We were extremely busy with telephone calls during that period from customers reporting highway flooding, external flooding and internal flooding. The message was in place to help customers report the issues to the correct agency and the majority of highway flooding was due to blocked road gullies which fall under the responsibility of the Local Highways Department”.

*As also argued in the meeting - the problem with UU’s division of sewer floods into FOC/HI problems is that a HI sewer can never be listed HI whilst FOC problems continue to be found; and problems DO seem to continue (maybe indefinitely) on some sewers such as the one in Lordsgate Lane adjacent to the Bull and Dog. Burscough PCs drainage expert reported (copy sent to UU) that this sewer [on Lordsgate Lane] was HI. I told UU during our meeting that I had spoken to a resident who told me that flooding on Lordsgate Lane was normal in heavy rainfall; and Stephen Howell [UU] wrote in an email to me on 1/4/16, "there remains a risk of limited localised flooding [on Lordsgate Lane even after repairs] during high intensity storms.”

*Inappropriate use of the “it’s the riparian owner’s problem” defence means some of UU’s regularly surcharging sewers aren’t recorded as HI by UU and therefore aren’t ever addressed by UU.

The Higgins Lane/Truscott Road junction irregularly causes floods and water travels along it, into between one and several houses. The main water sources are UU’s unattenuated surface water drains from the Manor Housing Estate which connect to UU’s unattenuated surface water drains from the Rivington Drive Housing Estate and both flow into UU’s surface water sewer underneath the Truscott Road, that surcharges in very heavy rainfall. All of the pipes are of equal diameter and good engineering practice, along with the flood victims’ experiences, indicates that UU’s sewer underneath the Higgins Lane/Truscott Road junction is undersized.
2nd Paragraph under D)4)WP_20151226_11_12_36 Open Letter of Compliant to Steve Mogford [from Gavin Rattray] continued CAS16:01664000000302 4th June 2016. “I can confirm that our [UU’s] investigations into the flooding in this area has identified that the cause of the flooding was a manhole on a culverted watercourse overflowing due to heavy rainfall. Culverted watercourses are riparian ownership and as this manhole is located in the highway, the responsibility would lie with the highway authority which in this case would be Lancashire County Council.”

Further Work:

I appreciate that you only have short time remaining in your current position, therefore I have kept to the issue I raised in the meeting.

Please could you kindly let your successor see this letter or let me have their contact details because I would like to raise other serious issues on behalf of BFG, which are:

1. BFG doesn’t believe the partnership between WLBC and UU is working properly in residents interests, because WLBC aren’t challenging UU over its many recent failures in Burscough. BFG have also found out that there is an unpublished mutual interest agreement between UU and WLBC circa 2011, which we believe could be preventing the correct working of the FRMA partnership.

2. BFG have no evidence but given the above, we have suspicions that other agencies such as LCC and the EA have also entered into similar agreements with UU.

3. 'Making space for water' meetings that take place between the FRMAs for West Lancashire, are in private and deliberately do not take minutes; and that means they are devoid of any democratic or public oversight.'