Flooding

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Monday 7th December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I know of my noble friend’s connections and strong affinity with Cumbria and the communities there. I am sure that the Cumbria Community Foundation is an excellent local charity but obviously it is not in my gift to make such a donation. However, I can say to him that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defra announced in her Statement that the Government will look over the coming days at what further steps they might take in support of those affected. I will ensure that his suggestion is put forward.

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords, as a former Member of Parliament for Workington, Cockermouth and Keswick, in expressing my sympathy I declare an interest as the convener of one of the flood action groups in Cumbria, occasionally meeting with the Environment Agency and United Utilities officials.

A lot of money has been spent on flood alleviation and resilience projects. However, none of the authorities concerned has been prepared to spend money on the big-ticket projects that are necessary if this unprecedented and unpredictable scale of flooding is to be avoided in future. Will Ministers now consider upstream storage, even including new reservoir projects, pump-primed with state money but ultimately transferred to the private sector? Will they consider the urgently needed re-engineering of outflow valves on the dam at Thirlmere? Will they consider statutory month-by-month limits on water asset management at Thirlmere? Will they consider the removal of the Gote Bridge in Cockermouth and the Greta Bridge in Keswick and their replacement by single-span bridges that stop the blocking of water flows? Will they consider strengthening the course of the River Derwent below Cockermouth, to remove some of the meanders, as raised by my noble friend on the Front Bench? Can we have a complete ban on housing development on the west Cumbrian flood plain? Finally, can we have a review of the coverage of Flood Re, which is now exposed as fatally flawed, as thousands of people will find that they are not covered, even under the new scheme when it is introduced?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for raising those important issues. I will take his comments back, with some of his detailed points on upstream storage, re-engineering, water levels at Thirlmere, bridges, and the use of reservoirs and other places to keep water back when we can. The whole area of water asset management is clearly going to be important. On housing, the planning guidance on new development has been very clear. I will look into the particular point about Cumbria, but well over 95% of new housing is now not built in flood-risk areas. The noble Lord and I had a conversation about Flood Re after Questions last week. I am looking into the particular point of long-term leaseholders: I hope I can at least help to address this situation.