Environmental Protection UK has urged the government to ensure that the new guidance commits councils to identifying and reporting contaminated land in a timely and consistent way.

The organisation believes that the regime, introduced in 2000 in England, has failed so far in getting all councils to make progress towards identifying and dealing with high risks sites.

EPUK’s chief executive, James Grugeon, said: “The contaminated land regime is necessary to help manage our legacy of land contamination but it is a complex regime underlined by much scientific uncertainty.

“Elements of the proposed guidance are cause for concern because they risk weakening the level of protection offered to human health and could lead to greater inconsistencies across local authorities.”

The organisation is calling on the government to make the necessary changes to ensure the underlying issues that they say have ‘dogged the regime’ are addressed.

Alison Brown

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