A Derbyshire town is at “crisis point” due to persistent flooding issues caused by heavy rainfall and an aging sewer network.
At a Derbyshire Dales District Council meeting this week, councillors debated plans for 75 houses off Chesterfield Road and Quarry Lane in Matlock.
Problems over the town’s persistent flooding dominated the discussion, with councillors concerned over an historic sewer network close to the site which was already regularly overflowing – spilling foul waste into the street, homes and a care home.
Cllr Joanne Linthwaite told the meeting that raw sewage was discharged into the Bentley Brook at nearby Lumsdale 41 times last year, for a total of 212 hours – nearly nine days.
She said it was a reality that residents were routinely seeing their homes flooded with ankle-deep brown water.
Sarah Wills, agent for the applicants, Homes by Honey, said drainage was not a consideration for the application, which had already been approved at outline stage, with this application seeking to tie up the final details.
She said there were seven drainage conditions agreed at the outline stage which seek to prevent flooding issues.
Cllr David Hughes said the council needs to formally address drainage issues in Matlock, saying Severn Trent clearly could not take the water that it said its system would be able to take.
He said the 75-home plans should be deferred pending discussions with Severn Trent to firm up issues around drainage.
Chris Whitmore, the council’s development manager, said deferring based on drainage could be deemed “unreasonable behaviour” because the issue does not form part of the application.
Cllr Sue Burfoot said: “We are at crisis point with flooding and sewage. Presentation Convent being flooded with sewage, people being flooded not once, but twice.
“It is the cumulative effect and unfortunately, it is the last developer (who built houses nearby), I am not saying they are the ones to blame, but the cumulative effect that we are experiencing is really serious.”
Cllr David Burton, chair of the meeting, said: “It is not a case of just deliberately trying to pull the rug from under your (council officers) feet.
“There is this big dilemma that things have changed since perhaps the outline consent, it is staring us all in the face.”
Cllr Hughes intimated that council officers would not want to live in nearby Lumsdale and that the current situation is that when it rains residents can expect the sewer to flood.
He said residents had been left needing to “wade across” a river of foul water in order to get to their homes.
Mr Whitmore said: “I fully respect members’ opinions on the development but what I don’t want members to do is to consider that new development is necessarily the problem here.
“I think we have got to look at the drainage network as a whole. If the principles of sustainable urban drainage work, then new development should offer betterment in terms of flood alleviation.
“What we are dealing with is a situation where you’ve got the vast majority of Matlock building which taps into antiquated drainage infrastructure – and climate change is here isn’t it? Rainfall events are more extreme, that is all entering the drainage network and overcharging it in certain areas.
“I fully accept that, but I think it is wrong without evidence to suggest it is the fault of new developments. I think it is probably a mixture of both, I don’t know. I don’t think we can make that assumption.
“The applicant is entitled to say this is unreasonable behaviour and to take it to appeal.”
Cllr Peter Dobbs said: “There is apparently a quite significant problem, possibly that wasn’t made evident when the outline permission was granted and therefore to do something and so we are doing the only thing we can because we have no other way.”
Cllr Peter O’Brian said the 75-home plan needed to be deferred to firm up drainage issues, with councillors voting nearly unanimously to postpone the application.
