Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the process is to (a) remove and (b) challenge longstanding noise abatement orders.

Local authorities are responsible for serving abatement notices where appropriate for noise nuisances deemed a statutory nuisance under the Environmental Protection Act 1990. An abatement notice will operate according to the conditions contained within it, which may require it to be indefinite, and which are set by the local authority serving the notice.

A person served with an abatement notice can appeal to a magistrate’s court within 21 days of the date on which the notice was served. Grounds for appeal include:

• legal tests haven’t been met to show that the issue is a statutory nuisance
• the notice was served on the wrong person
• the notice is defective

Industrial, trade and business premises can claim the use of “best practicable means” in their defence. This may be used as grounds for appeal against the abatement notice or a defence (if prosecuted) for not complying with the abatement notice. Only the courts can determine what the best practicable means are in each case, taking into account, among other things, the local conditions and circumstances, the current state of technical knowledge and the financial implications.