John Duff, Chairman RICS Scotland and Sarah Speirs, Head of Communications, RICS Scotland, recently met with representatives from the Customer Connections arm of Scottish Water.

The purpose of the meeting was to forge better relations between RICS Scotland and Scottish Water and to flag up any issues which were or could potentially cause problems for either organisation.

Scottish Water is now a much more customer focused organisation and they are seeking to promote better relationships with developers, land owners, planners and the community by promoting a culture of ‘early engagement’. More focus is being placed on meeting with developers at the pre-planning stage to ensure that the connection, capacity and waste water treatment elements of a development meet the requirements of the site and those of Scottish Water.

Scottish Water has produced an Asset Information model which clearly lays out in four parts, the responsibilities for water and waste water connections:

• Part 1: Waste water (drain) and Water (service pipe): the connection responsibility lies with the developer.
• Part 2: Wastewater (local sewer) Water (local main): the connection responsibility lies with the developer / home owner.
• Part 3: Waste  Water (trunk sewer, pumping station and trunk main service reservoir – connection responsibility lies with SW
• Part 4: Water (water treatment and catchment) and Part 4 Wastewater (treatment and discharge) – Connection responsibility lies with SW

PAN 79 clarifies the role of the planning authority in setting the direction of development to inform the planning and delivery of new water infrastructure in a coordinated way. It explains the roles of Scottish Water and SEPA and encourages joint working in order to ensure a common understanding of capacity constraints and agreement on the means of their removal. It advises on the appropriateness of private schemes and the handling of Scottish Water developments. A copy of PAN 79 is available from the PDF Downloads section.

Scottish Water has recognised the need to be more customer focused and they have committed themselves to the following principles:

• Initial multi-function Response Team has now been set up and now bedded into improved Business as Usual
• Introduced Structural and Management change into Planning & Developer Services; Connections Team and Asset Development Planning Team
• Introduced Account Managers and Account Team working for all 32 Councils, 2 National parks, Key Developers and Key Development Community Parties

Scottish Water are keen to engage with developers at an early stage and are keen to promote the benefits of direct contact with their account managers instead of relying solely on the Planning Application process. Early engagement is beneficial to both parties and allows possible delays to a planning application to be flagged-up and resolved (where possible) at the beginning of the process rather than during or at the end. 

RICS Scotland will continue to maintain an open dialogue with Scottish Water and a list of their key contacts is available from the PDF Downloads section.

If you would like any further information, please contact Sarah Speirs e sspeirs@rics.org.