[1] Prior to the 1930s, land drainage in the United Kingdom was regulated by the Statute of Sewers, passed by King Henry VIII in 1531, and several further acts which built upon that foundation.
Complaints to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries made during the 1920s by existing drainage boards and those who lived and worked in the areas they covered led to the government deciding that a thorough review of the situation should be carried out.
[3] The report described the existing laws as "vague and ill-defined, full of anomalies, obscure, lacking in uniformity, and even chaotic."
[10] A total of 32 boards were eventually created, covering the whole of England and Wales, with responsibilities for land drainage, fisheries and river pollution.
Where there were existing catchment boards, they inherited these powers,[11] and where there were not, they took over the duties of flood prevention on main rivers from local authorities.