Currently, the Environment Agency (EA) has two separate policies in place, the Enforcement and Sanctions Statement (ESS) and the Enforcement and Sanctions Guidance (ESG), which will be combined and shortened into a single new Enforcement and Sanctions Policy (ESP).

The climate change schemes annex has been reviewed. The maximum penalties for the climate change schemes are set in legislation. The EA has the discretion to waive, reduce or extend the time for payment of the penalties. For the majority of breaches, the EA has proposed to amend our method to applying penalties by using a stepped approach, which will be appropriate for the schemes.

The steps include a ‘nature of the breach’ assessment and consideration of other enforcement positions. The EA will adopt these approaches when considering imposing penalties under the Climate Change schemes.

The EA will still consider all comments made about the approach during this consultation; they will review and revise the approach in light of these comments if they consider they are appropriate.

The consultation can be viewed here.

If you have any questions or concerns please contact me, Steve, on 024 7669 3043.