Water Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Baroness Parminter

Tuesday 11th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Parminter (LD)]

My Lords, I put my name to my noble friend Lord Moynihan’s amendment and I shall speak briefly in support of it.

The Government’s impact assessment on managing the future financial risk of flooding states that there is insufficient evidence of a problem for businesses to get insurance and that there are other market mechanisms for them to get cover. However, the impact assessment focuses on the national impact, whereas flooding affects localities, so it is perhaps no surprise that it did not find that much evidence.

Further, the Government’s position is driven by their recent consultation on the issue, which asked for evidence of a need for a mechanism for small businesses and received a few responses from small businesses, which may well have had other priorities. The ABI has given the Government assurances that the broker community is doing,

“a good job working directly with business customers in getting a good deal for them”.

I contend that it is the Government’s job to insist that there be firm evidence of that, which is what the amendment is intended to deliver.

There are few studies of the impact of flooding incidents in general on business, apart from some by AXA, and they focus on the impact on individual businesses rather than the broader economic resilience of communities in the face of flooding. I could not find any research which looks at the significant impact of flooding on small businesses, which often make up the backbone of the rural economy. It is here that flooding has a huge impact not just on individual families and their businesses but on the complex web of supply and demand chains in the local economy. Ensuring adequate flood cover for small businesses, including farm businesses, is as important as supporting households if we are to protect the overall community resilience of rural areas.

As my noble friend Lord Moynihan said, small businesses were covered by the statement of principles and they were able to get flood risk insurance in the same way as households. Given that Flood Re does not guarantee them that insurance, we certainly need reassurance from the Government that they are mindful of the need for cover for businesses, particularly small businesses, and of their important role in rural communities.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde (Con)]

My Lords, I should declare an interest that I declared on Second Reading, which is that, until June, I was the chief executive of two insurance companies, and I still labour under some residual contract limitations.

There is an overriding need to put in place a workable solution that will, first, solve the most pressing need, which is to address the availability and cost of flood insurance and, secondly, do so in a way that is timely, affordable to the insurance industry, secured in co-operation with it and that does not allow government subsidy to create a huge deficit in the scheme over time.

Addressing the issue of small businesses raised by the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, we ought to remind ourselves that the statement of principles only covers the availability, not the affordability, of insurance for those small businesses. It covers only renewal policies, so the policyholder at risk of flooding cannot change insurer, and it does not cover the cost of the policy.

There is also the question of practicality. The introduction of businesses into Flood Re would dramatically complicate the pricing of the scheme, the availability of Flood Re as crucial reinsurance—on which the scheme depends—and, by no means least, the complexity of the internal model, which will have to be approved by the PRA. All the different coverage afforded by business policies, such as business interruption, contingent business interruption and loss of profits, will make the internal model much more complicated compared to what are fairly homogenous homeowners’ policies.

To address the most pressing need as soon as possible in a way that is acceptable to as many people as possible, we should concentrate on the most important issues and leave the Flood Re design as it is.