Water Resources Act 1991

37 Publication of application for licence

(1) The Authority shall not entertain an application for a licence under this Chapter to abstract water or to obstruct or impede the flow of any inland waters by means of impounding works or for a combined licence, unless the application is accompanied—

(a) by a copy of a notice in the prescribed form; and

(b) by the prescribed evidence that the necessary notices of the application have been given.

(2) Subject to subsection (3) below, the necessary notices of an application have been given for the purposes of subsection (1) above if—

(a) the notice mentioned in paragraph (a) of that subsection has been published—

(i) in the London Gazette; and

(ii) at least once in each of two successive weeks, in one or more newspapers (other than the London Gazette) circulating in the relevant locality;

and

(b) a copy of that notice has been served, not later than the date on which it was first published as mentioned in paragraph (a)(ii) above—

(i) on any navigation authority, harbour authority or conservancy authority having functions in relation to any inland waters at a proposed point of abstraction or impounding;

(ii) on the drainage board for any internal drainage district within which any such proposed point is situated; and

(iii) on any water undertaker within whose area any such proposed point is situated.

(3) Where the licence applied for is exclusively for the abstraction of water from a source of supply that does not form part of any inland waters, the giving of the necessary notices shall not for the purposes of subsection (1) above require the service of any copy of the notice mentioned in paragraph (a) of that subsection on any navigation authority, harbour authority, conservancy authority or drainage board.

(4) A notice for the purposes of the preceding provisions of this section, in addition to containing any other matters required to be contained in that notice, shall—

(a) name a place within the relevant locality where a copy of the application, and of any map, plan or other document submitted with it, will be open to inspection by the public, free of charge, at all reasonable hours during a period specified in the notice in accordance with subsection (5) below; and

(b) state that any person may make representations in writing to the Authority with respect to the application at any time before the end of that period.

(5) The period specified in a notice for the purposes of the preceding provisions of this section shall be a period which—

(a) begins not earlier than the date on which the notice is first published in a newspaper other than the London Gazette; and

(b) ends not less than twenty-eight days from that date and not less than twenty-five days from the date on which the notice is published in the London Gazette.

(6) Where—

(a) an application for a licence under this Chapter to abstract water is made to the Authority; and

(b) the application proposes that the quantity of water abstracted in pursuance of the licence should not in any period of twenty-four hours exceed, in aggregate, twenty cubic metres or any lesser amount specified in the application,

the Authority may dispense with the requirements imposed by virtue of the preceding provisions of this section if and to the extent that it appears to the Authority appropriate to do so.

(7) In this section—

• “proposed point of abstraction or impounding”, in relation to any application for a licence under this Chapter, means a place where a licence, if granted in accordance with the application, would authorise water to be abstracted or, as the case may be, would authorise inland waters to be obstructed or impeded by means of impounding works; and

• “relevant locality”, in relation to an application for a licence under this Act, means the locality in which any proposed point of abstraction or impounding is situated.