Edinburgh Airport Rail Link Bill Committee, 20 Jun 2006
Meeting date: Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Official Report
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Appropriate Assessment
The committee will now consider its role with regard to appropriate assessment. As members are aware, the Edinburgh Airport Rail Link Bill proposes to divert temporarily a 50m to 100m section of the River Almond. Because that proposal might impact on the Firth of Forth, which is a special protection area, the Parliament, as the competent authority, is required to undertake an appropriate assessment of the project's impact on the SPA and to find out whether any steps could or should be taken to negate or mitigate any impacts.
Members will note that Scottish Natural Heritage has been liaising with the promoter over the bill's potential impact on the Firth of Forth and has asked the promoter to provide additional information, which is contained in the promoter's report entitled "Edinburgh Airport Rail Link: An Assessment of the Effects to the Firth of Forth Special Protection Area". Having considered the report and the mitigation proposed in the environmental statement, the code of construction practice and other working guidelines, SNH feels that the EARL scheme will have a low impact on the Firth of Forth. However, members should note that in its letter to the committee, which is set out in annex B of paper EARL/S2/06/5/2, SNH indicates that its view is dependent on the delivery of the mitigation measures proposed in those documents when EARL is constructed.
Members will also recall that at last week's meeting the promoter indicated that it would be minded to recommend that the bill be amended to ensure that the mitigation proposed in the environmental statement is enforceable. Given the experience of other private bills, I suspect that the issue of enforceability will form part of consideration stage evidence on objections—assuming, of course, that the bill proceeds to that stage.
As a result, I believe that it would be prudent for the committee to consider the issue of appropriate assessment in more detail at phase 1 of the consideration stage, particularly in light of the evidence that will be taken at that stage. Are members agreed?
Members indicated agreement.