Coastal Erosion

Lord Bellingham Excerpts

Tuesday 12th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[Kirstene Hair (Angus) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered coastal erosion.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. The future of Britain’s coastline, and of our coastal communities, is finally getting the political attention that it deserves—not a moment too soon. From the need to curb plastic waste to prevent environmental damage to our shores to the opportunities that Brexit presents for reviving our long-struggling fishing communities, Britain’s coasts are coming to the forefront of the political agenda. I am glad, because if our coastal communities are to benefit from this renewed focus on their future, we need to act now to ensure that they have a future.

Coastal erosion threatens large parts of Britain’s coasts and puts houses, businesses and entire communities at risk of flooding or, in some cases, total destruction. Many hon. Members will be familiar with this issue, as coastal erosion threatens about 17% of the UK’s coastline, specifically along the east coast. The Environment Agency estimates that more than 700 properties in England could be lost to coastal erosion by the 2030s, while in Scotland, erosion is believed to pose a risk to a fifth of the coastline and the erosion rate has doubled since the 1970s. In 2013 and 2014, storms and extreme tides caused erosion that experts believed would never happen, but it has happened, and even quicker than they thought as it occurred almost overnight. Businesses and individuals are increasingly concerned about the impact of the increasingly rapid degradation of our coastline.

Our coasts are vital areas and hubs of economic activity. As well as the obvious tourism draws, they are home to much of our crucial infrastructure. In Scotland, the soft coastline, which is about 19% of the total, and which is most at risk, includes roads, railways and Scotland’s water network. There are 30,000 buildings, 100 km of railway lines, 1,300 km of our roads and a large amount of cultural and natural heritage located near to potentially erodible stretches of the Scottish coast. They could come under threat if erosion rates continued to increase in the near future.

[Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. She will be aware that East Anglia suffered serious floods as the result of surge tides in 2013. The private sector has financed a lot of the recharging of the beaches through a community interest company in my constituency, but does she agree that that will not be enough in future and that there will have to be some form of ring-fenced funding?

[Kirstene Hair]

I am sure my hon. Friend will be pleased to hear what I am calling for the Minister to provide for my community and his.

It is time that Government at all levels took the issue more seriously. In the past, they have been guilty of putting too much emphasis on study and not enough on preventive action. If ever there was a time for urgent action, my constituents would say that it is now.

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[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Thank you for that, Sir David. Four minutes? What a challenge.

I thank the hon. Member for Angus (Kirstene Hair) for bringing this matter to Westminster Hall for consideration. I am very happy to support her, as she knows. I am glad to say that I come from what I believe to be one of the most beautiful constituencies in the whole of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland—Strangford. I am privileged to live in the heart of the Ards peninsula, on the family farm. Every morning, I wake up and look over at Strangford lough, and I am very aware of the beauty of the area. I see the sun glinting off the water, I see the mountains of Mourne in the distance and I am always very conscious of the wonder of God’s creation.

At the same time, the sun glinting off the water alerts me to the issue of coastal erosion. The water may seem somewhat pretty at times, but the fact is that our coastline is crumbling away under our feet, under the foundations of our homes and under our coastal roads. Our foundation is crumbling and we must do something to address that. The issue is not a new one. I will give a Northern Ireland perspective, to show where I am on it. When I wore my former hat as an Assembly Member, I spoke about it in the Northern Ireland Assembly and things have naturally worsened since then.

Most recently, I read an article that referred to a report by the National Trust that had been commissioned on the issue of coastal erosion, which stated the shocking view that:

“Northern Ireland faces major risks from coastal erosion and marine flooding but ‘lacks basic information’”—

those are the very things that the hon. Member for Angus referred to—

“to deal with them.”

The article went on to say that the National Trust

“manages 108 miles of coast in the north, reveals that 46,000 properties are at risk from river or marine flooding, while recent stormy winters have had ‘major impacts on coastal residents’.

Climate change and rising sea-levels are leading to flooding and coastal erosion, the report found. The charity has called for ‘a strategic approach to shoreline management’ to address the challenges of marine flooding and erosion…saying at present it is ‘reactive and poorly structured’”.

That is exactly the problem that our region, like other regions, faces and it is something we are concerned about.

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

The hon. Gentleman talked about shoreline management. Does he agree that there is a major role for the private sector to contribute, working in partnership with local authorities?

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and I totally agree with what he has said. Northern Ireland has a lack of information about how its coast works—the rates of change, the sources of coastal material, patterns of sand movement, the impact of storms and post-storm recovery—along most of the coastline. Those are the issues for us when it comes to coastal erosion.

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[Gillian Keegan (Chichester) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Kirstene Hair) on securing this important debate and highlighting the risk to all our coastal communities.

Many of my constituents are lucky enough to live by the sea, with beautiful views and a vibrant tourism economy. The Chichester constituency is home to some of the UK’s most beautiful beaches and diverse marine ecosystems, but with those privileges comes a great deal of risk. Coastal erosion and flooding are a constant threat to many areas. Over the past century, we have observed a global mean sea level rise of 20 cm and that trend is set to continue over the coming years, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. To contextualise that, just a 50 cm rise in local sea levels would make 200 km of our current defences vulnerable to failure. Under the IPCC’s modelling, that is within the range of likely outcomes by the end of this century.

In my area, Chichester District Council is doing well to tackle the symptoms, if not the cause. It maintains the majority of the populated open coastline that stretches from Emsworth to Pagham. The council has shoreline management plans in place for each stretch of its coastline. Its work is highly collaborative and transparent, and by working with local stakeholders and the Environment Agency, it ensures that its work benefits the area’s economy, community and ecosystems.

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

My local council has similar policies in place, but there is a real problem coming down the track with the disappearance of the revenue support grant. When that goes, there will surely have to be some form of top-slicing or maybe a ring-fenced precept for local authorities such as my hon. Friend’s and mine.

[Gillian Keegan]

I agree. My local authority is very concerned by negative RSG, not just the disappearance of RSG. Negative RSG would mean having to pay more to support other areas.

The council’s collaborative work has achieved high levels of third-party investment and led to better coastal protection. My hon. Friend is right that we need to properly fund our coastal areas. At East Head and at Pagham harbour, coastal advisory groups run the UK’s only two active management sites. Both sites have a highly dynamic coastline, so predicting erosive and flood patterns can be very challenging. Active management involves long-term monitoring and observation to ensure interventions are effective and in tune with the natural processes.

The regional coastal monitoring programme, based in Southampton, is key to that process, providing data on waves, tides and the changing nature of the coastline. Armed with that data, the group can make decisions on interventions such as replacing or removing failing structures or replenishing beach sediments. Such is the success of the programme that natural changes at Pagham since 2016 have removed the threat to residents in the short term and introduced an intertidal wetland habitat that is now a Royal Society for the Protection of Birds nature reserve.

The council receives a grant of £250,000 a year. That funding allows it to protect people, business and habitats. Over recent years, the Environment Agency has invested a further £30 million as part of its flood and coastal erosion risk management at Medmerry, where the UK’s first managed realignment site is ongoing. West Wittering, where erosive processes are mitigated to maintain the beach, attracted around 800,000 visitors last year, driving the local economy and simultaneously helping protect the internationally important saltmarsh environment sheltered by East Head spit.

There is still significant concern in my area, however. In the long term, the council has warned that highly populated areas such as Selsey, Bracklesham and East Wittering will eventually require significant investment.

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[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

In following the hon. Lady’s speech just now, I am not certain as to which is eroding more quickly: the coastline of Scotland or support for the increasingly incompetent SNP Administration in Edinburgh.

I want to confine my remarks to a particular part of my constituency, one of the jewels in the crown of East Devon: Sidmouth, a regency seaside town well known to my hon. Friend the Minister. Sidmouth is at the gateway to the Jurassic coast world heritage site, and a large part of the town is in a conservation area. For years now, I have been working with various bodies and individuals in the town—not least the local councillors, Councillor Stuart Hughes and now Councillor Tom Wright—to try to resolve what has become an increasingly difficult problem, particularly for the residents of Cliff Road, overlooking Pennington Point, which has seen erosion year on year. Indeed, earlier in 2018 it was widely reported in the national press that Cliff Road was one of the most endangered roads in the UK, owing to coastal erosion.

We are very dependent on the south-west coastal path in Sidmouth. We have replaced the Alma bridge, but the various different schemes have gone on for too long. Over the years I have had Sir James Bevan, the chief executive of the Environment Agency, down to see the erosion. Andrew Sells, who is in charge of Natural England, has been down. I even had my right hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson), who was then the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, come and look at it.

There are two issues at stake. One is the complexity of trying to get a satisfactory solution. It is a complicated engineering issue. Many different bodies are involved in the steering group: East Devon District Council, Sidmouth Town Council, local fishermen, the Environment Agency, Devon County Council, the National Trust and the Cliff Road Action Group. All of those groups have a rightful interest, but that has delayed the implementation of a scheme that can arrest the erosion that we see year on year.

The new scheme, the preferred scheme, for the Sidmouth beach management plan would see a new groyne wall installed on East Beach and a plan to raise the splash wall along the promenade. I am extremely nervous about the prospect of raising the wall along the promenade because we have seen what happened in the neighbouring constituency of Tiverton and Honiton: one can drive down the esplanade in Seaton and not actually see the sea. We would not want that replicated in Sidmouth. This part of the £9 million project would last around 100 years.

We now have a funding issue. East Devon District Council needs to raise £3.3 million, with the rest hopefully being secured from the Environment Agency. Work would begin in 2019 and be completed in 2020. When we look at the areas we can raise the money from, we see that we are left with either a local levy, the district council, Sidmouth Town Council, South West Water, local charities, visitors, East Devon housing, and residents. I humbly submit to the Minister that it is not satisfactory to try to leave a small local authority with a funding gap that will prevent the scheme from being realised.

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

My hon. Friend is being incredibly generous in giving way. My local authority has similar problems, but it faces a structural funding deficit. The Minister’s Department and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government must consider making some form of ring-fenced precept available to local councils, and perhaps there should be more contributions from town and parish councils inland.

[Sir Hugo Swire]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it is almost impossible to ask local authorities for large amounts of money to fill the gap because they all operate under very strict financial constraints now. Such schemes should not be held back by relying on the local authority to make up the difference, so I ask the Minister whether Bellwin can be extended. Can my residents of Cliff Road, who have found it impossible to get mortgages and increasingly difficult to get insurance as they see their gardens disappear, get a compensation package?

I hope that the whole area can be dealt with quickly. We need a masterplan for the whole Port Royal area along the esplanade, but there is no point in doing that until we have secured the Pennington Point and rock revetment scheme, because that would threaten the sewage works in the area, which could in due course flood the entire town.

I do not want to delay the debate unduly. The Minister is welcome to come to Sidmouth at any time to see the situation for himself. We are almost there now. This has gone on for so long. The scheme must be implemented. We cannot wait any longer. We have got people onside. We have got everything lined up now. I pay tribute to all those who have got this far, but we have a funding deficit and I ask the Minister to be creative in looking at the compensation issue for the residents of Cliff Road and also in helping with the funding that we need to get the scheme under way.