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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the potential financial effect on property owners of changes to septic tank regulations which come into force on 1 January 2020.

There was a regulatory impact assessment which considered the financial impact of the 2014 regulation changes of the regulatory system for controlling small sewage discharges from sceptic tanks which can be found here http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2014/2852/contents

The outcome of this was a beneficial saving to home owners and businesses as operators of small sewage discharges.

The aim of the changes is to protect water quality and were a means of reducing regulatory burden on primarily home owners and households. They removed the need to register a discharge whilst aiming to ensure maintenance of environmental protection and to prevent discharges causing pollution.

Under polluter pays principle it is an owners responsibility to comply with legislative requirements and to prevent pollution. There are no grants available for homeowners to improve or upgrade their discharges.