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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the Environment Agency has made a recent assessment of the safety of historic landfill sites that are in close proximity to urban areas.

Local Authorities have the statutory duty to inspect their Areas to identify contaminated land (including historic landfills and non-permitted sites) in accordance with a written inspection strategy which they must publish and maintain.

The Environment Agency has responsibility to require those responsible to remediate historic landfills and non-permitted sites if they have been determined as contaminated land and designated as a ‘special site’ by the local authority under Part 2A of the Environmental Protection Act 1990.

Since 2000, 54 sites have been designated as special sites including 13 historic landfills Contaminated Land Special Sites - data.gov.uk