Marine licence: Dredging 

RYA lobbying to ensure that the new requirement to obtain a marine licence for maintenance dredging is proportionate.

The RYA is lobbying the MMO in England, and the licensing bodies for Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales in an effort to ensure that the marine licence system for maintenance/navigational dredging is fair and proportionate, in terms of both the regulatory and financial burdens on clubs and training centres.

The RYA’s position is that maintenance/navigational dredging is a small-scale, low impact activity and as such the regulatory system for managing consent and the marine licence fee should be proportionate to this.

Licensing systems are being developed

In England, the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) is currently developing its management plan for administering marine licences for these previously unlicensed dredging activities.

The Department of Environment Northern Ireland, Marine Scotland and the Welsh Government Marine Consents Unit are also developing their own plans within their respective jurisdictions.

Ministerial assurances secured by the RYA

Discussions have been founded on Ministerial assurances secured by the RYA and the BMF during the passage of the Marine and Coastal Access Act (2009) that regulatory controls would be applied ‘proportionately to the risk and impact of the marine activity’. 

The Minister also stated that “we are actively exploring the extent to which we can exempt low-risk dredging activities from the need for a marine licence. We want to ensure that operators doing the necessary work of keeping navigational channels clear of silt and other debris can continue to do so without unnecessary regulatory burden, but still with adequate regard to the impact of their activities.”

However, it has become clear that these Ministerial assurances had not been communicated to the MMO.

Limited experience to draw upon

In addition, because maintenance/navigational dredging has not previously been an activity subject to licence, the MMO has limited experience to draw upon in ascertaining how much it will cost to administer and therefore what the licence fee should be. It is not clear at this stage how the relevant authorities in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales will approach this issue.

This dredging will still need to go through the existing processes, such as gaining consent from the harbour authority or approval from Government advisors such as Natural England or the Environment Agency.

As a separate issue the RYA also has concerns with the marine licensing fee structure developed by the MMO for England.