Environment Agency faces legal battle over water removal in Norfolk Broads

theguardian.com:

A couple are taking the Environment Agency to the high court in a landmark case to stop the abstraction of water damaging internationally important wetlands in the Norfolk Broads.

In a sign of the growing struggle over the allocation of scarce water resources in the dry south-east, Tim and Geli Harris are seeking to reduce the removal of groundwater to irrigate potatoes and other crops farmed next to three protected wetlands, including Hickling Broad national nature reserve.

The couple, who are farmers themselves, have spent £1m on legal challenges, winning a key battle six years ago when a public inquiry proved that abstraction licences were damaging critically endangered plants such as the fen orchid at Catfield Fen, a site of special scientific interest (SSSI), which they in part own.

This victory forced the Environment Agency to assess how much abstraction reduces the flow of groundwater and pledge to keep reductions in groundwater flows in the protected section of the Ant valley to less than 5% rather than more than 50%, as was routinely occurring.

But the agency’s own data revealed that abstraction continued to reduce groundwater flows by more than 50% at more than two dozen locations close to three nearby SSSIs: Smallburgh Fen, Potter Heigham marshes and Hickling Broad, which is renowned for being the richest area for stoneworts in Britain.

The Harrises are taking the agency to a judicial review next month, arguing that it is legally obliged under the habitats directive – the EU protections enshrined in British law – to protect these sites by reducing abstraction.

“Once you damage a calcareous fen it’s gone – you can’t mend it. It’s like a rainforest,” said Tim Harris.

The Harrises fear that the Environment Agency’s