The Scottish Government

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Chapter one
INTRODUCTION

1.1 The Water Framework Directive ¹ establishes a new framework for the management and protection of Scotland's natural water environment - our rivers, lochs, estuaries, coastal waters and groundwaters. It is both a significant opportunity and a significant challenge. It affords us the opportunity to make a step-change in the way we protect Scotland's water environment and also the opportunity to streamline the way we regulate those whose use of water requires control. However, it provides us with a corresponding challenge - to do so in a manner suitable to the Scottish situation and sensitive to those in Scotland whose interests will be affected by it. We will seek to do exactly that but we realise that we will not be able to do so alone. Your views will be crucial to our success.

1.2 For that reason, we are clear that this consultation paper is only the start of the process of consultation and dialogue that will continue up to and beyond the point at which the Water Environment Bill becomes an Act. We fully realise that putting the legislative framework in place for the Directive is only part of the job. Much of the detailed work to make it operational will be just as crucial to the success of the whole project. We will seek to involve all interests at that stage as well. For now, we will concentrate on the policy that underpins the Bill.

1.3 We will consult again before the introduction of the Bill. However, we believe that consultation on this important subject for Scotland and its environment cannot be solely paper based. For that reason, we will continue the dialogue that we have already started with many organisations and individuals about the Directive. We also hope to open up channels of communication with people and bodies not previously involved. On top of that we shall host a conference during the consultation period on this document at which all those with an interest will be able to exchange views on the Directive and how it should be implemented in Scotland.

1.4 You can obtain a copy of the Directive by contacting us, our details are given later on in this paper. Alternatively, you can look it up on the web at: www.europa.eu.int/eur-lex

Scotland's Water Environment and the Water Framework Directive

1.5 Scotland is blessed with some of the most beautiful and dramatic rivers, lochs and estuaries in the world. It also has many working rivers upon which the prosperity and amenity of our urban areas depends. We also have a long, rugged and much admired coastline. Perhaps less well known, but of equal importance to the many eco-systems they support, are our groundwater resources. It is no exaggeration to say that Scotland's image across the world as an exporter and as a tourism destination depends on our healthy and clean environment.

1.6 The Water Framework Directive and the Bill that we will introduce next year to implement its provisions should greatly improve the way we manage and protect these important assets and that crucial image. They will do so by:

• putting ecology at the heart of the system - concern for the chemical quality of our water is not enough - the condition of the fish, animal, plant and other life that inhabit our waters will now be the key factor;
• tackling difficult issues like the impact of diffuse pollution from agriculture and urban areas;
• establishing a system of management that recognises that water systems are interdependent - from head stream to the sea - and ensures all those with an interest get their say;
• requiring the collection of better information so we know where the problems are;
• introducing a regime for regulation of the abstraction of water and other physical impacts on water courses so that where they cause problems - for example where over abstraction causes rivers to run too dry - they can be tackled;
• improving the existing system for control of discharges to make it more relevant and better able to cope with new industries - fish farming for example;
• promoting sustainable development and biodiversity; and
• doing all of this in a manner that properly balances the interests of the environment with those who depend upon it.

1.7 Before we go further we should consider what the state of Scotland's water environment is now. The most recent comprehensive analysis of the state of Scotland's water environment is set out in 'Improving Scotland's Water Environment: SEPA State of the Environment Report' published in 1999. The headline figures provide a useful context for our present deliberations:

• Rivers - just over 91% of 50,000 km of classified rivers were of excellent or good quality. Over 4,000 km were classified as polluted.
• Lochs - of the 173 lochs classified by SEPA 143 were of excellent or good quality whereas 30 were polluted.
• Estuaries - 96% of the 810 km ² of classified estuarine waters were of excellent or good quality - the remaining 4% were polluted.
• Coastal Waters - of the 6,900 km classified by SEPA 96% were either excellent or good and the remaining 4% polluted.

1.8 However, these figures do not tell the whole story. They are only concerned with pollution. Of course, measures to tackle pollution are crucial but there are many other impacts that affect the quality of the water environment. The Water Framework Directive provides the means to tackle all of these.

1.9 The quality of our river habitat was the subject of a major report in 1998 ². This suggested that a combination of physical alterations and land-use changes has had just as significant an impact on our water environment as pollution. Some of these activities and their impacts are set out in Table 1.1. The report showed that these activities and their impacts are evident across Scotland.

Table 1.1: Activities and their Impacts on River Habitats

European initiatives on water - need for the Water Framework Directive

1.10 The Water Framework Directive applies across the European Union (EU). The countries seeking membership of the EU will also have to work towards its implementation. It will therefore ensure that all European waters - from Greece to the Grampians - are protected according to a common standard. The EU has taken an interest in the protection of the water environment across the continent since the 1970s. There is now a raft of existing legislation that is directed at protecting specific types of waters - bathing waters and those used for drinking water for example - and at tackling specific impacts - e.g. sewage discharges and pollution by nitrates from agriculture. This legislation has achieved significant improvements but, as we have seen, there are still issues to be addressed. The Water Framework Directive addresses them.

1.11 Following the Commission's February 1997 proposal for the Directive, a period of negotiation between the European Parliament and the European Council led to an agreement on the final text of the Directive in June 2000. The Directive then entered into force on 22 December 2000. All the timescales set in the Directive for its implementation, including the obligation to transpose its provisions into national law within 3 years, run from that date.

1.12 The provisions of several pieces of the earlier Community water legislation have been integrated into the Water Framework Directive, allowing the earlier Directives to be repealed in a phased approach. These include the Freshwater Fish Directive, the Shellfish Water Directive and the Dangerous Substances Directive. However, the Water Framework Directive is not intended to replace some more recent pieces of legislation and will complement the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive, the Nitrates Directive, the Bathing Water Directive, the Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) Directive and the 'Natura' Directives on the protection of birds and habitats. Measures taken under these Directives will in many cases contribute to the objectives for water quality established under the Water Framework Directive.

The Water Framework Directive

1.13 So what does the Water Framework Directive do? It is a complex and lengthy piece of legislation with 26 Articles and 11 annexes - it is not susceptible to easy encapsulation. However, its central purpose is clear. It will ensure that for the first time the water environment across Europe is managed in a co-ordinated and sensible manner. Moreover, it requires that all activities that impact adversely on the quality (using quality in its widest sense) of the water environment are controlled. Our rivers and lochs are the lifeblood of our communities - the Water Framework Directive will ensure their continued good health for future generations.

1.14 We have already seen that while the vast majority of our rivers, lochs, estuaries, coastal waters and groundwaters are of high quality, problems do exist. Moreover, what the bald statistics about quality don't tell us is the range of uses and users of our waters and the value of them to Scotland. Sources of drinking water; important habitats for many birds, fish and other animals; an important resource for many important industries; a focus for leisure and recreation - only some of the ways in which we depend on our rivers, lochs and other water bodies. We should also bear in mind the crucial importance to Scotland's image abroad of its clean cold lochs and fast flowing vibrant rivers teeming with salmon and trout. How might tourism and business suffer if we allowed their quality to be diminished?

1.15 Crucial to an understanding of the Water Framework Directive is an appreciation of the fact that although it is concerned with 'water' its scope is not restricted to what happens on or in water. The quality of any river, body of groundwater or other body of water will be determined not just by what happens within its banks but also by what happens on the land around it. A spill of polluting material - e.g. oil - quite remote from a river may well find its way there with devastating effects. The construction of a housing development on a flood plain may create exacerbated flooding problems downstream. For that reason, the scope of the WFD is not restricted to rivers or lochs or coastal waters - rather it requires consideration of any human intervention that could affect the quality of water, wherever that intervention takes place.

1.16 The Directive does that by requiring the management of our water environment based on natural river basins. A river basin is the area of land from which all water flows towards the sea through a series of burns, rivers and lochs entering the sea at a single point. Sometimes known as catchments these river basins are the building blocks of the WFD. They may be managed individually or combined together with other catchments but each catchment must be managed as a whole, together with their associated groundwaters - underground water below the soil, often in distinct layers of rock or aquifers

1.17 For each River Basin District (a single catchment or number of them combined) a strategic management plan must be drawn up. This plan will establish an environmental objective - a quality target - for each water body. A water body could be a river or loch or part of a river or loch or groundwater. The Directive sets a default objective of 'good' status - although variations from that are allowed. It also requires that no deterioration in status be allowed - a provision that will be particularly applicable to Scotland given the already good condition of much of our waters, although again here derogations are allowed in certain limited circumstances.

1.18 These environmental objectives are based on ecology. This means that the plants and animals (fish as well as insects and other invertebrates) that live in our natural waters will become the principal indicators of success at protecting and improving the water environment. Both chemical and physical conditions must be right for them to flourish. Ultimately, what is good for them will also be good for us.

1.19 Having set the environmental objective the plan must set out how that objective will be achieved. If a particular loch or stretch of coastal water is damaged or polluted - what needs to be done to retrieve the situation? The plan will also contain a comprehensive analysis of the pressures on water quality in that river basin.

1.20 Having established the plan and having put the measures in place to achieve the objectives the next stage in the process is comprehensive monitoring to check that the objectives have been met. Thereafter, the process of planning, action and monitoring starts again.

1.21 This has been a very quick snapshot of the Directive - these issues and more will be fleshed out later in this document.

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