Flood Defences

Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville Excerpts

Wednesday 26th November 2014 Grand Committee

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, for securing this debate. Flooding and its long-term effects is a subject dear to my heart and one from which the local community in Somerset has not fully recovered following last year’s appalling weather, which has been referred to by other noble Lords. Everyone saw on their television screens the effects on the communities of the Somerset Levels and surrounding villages. Night after night, week after week, we saw images of homes flooded and of people cut off from schools, shops, jobs and communities.

We saw the sterling work of the fire brigade and their boats in rescuing and ferrying people to and from their homes to safety. We witnessed innumerable visits from dignitaries, high-ranking officials, party leaders and others as they went on fact-finding missions, offered words of sympathy and promised metaphorical jam tomorrow. Government and local councils, submerged—forgive the pun—by the welter of publicity surrounding them, announced initiative after initiative in response to the call to do something. Sadly, this then became part of the problem and not necessarily the solution.

There was money from Defra, the DCLG, the Environment Agency, LEPs, county councils, district councils and others, some of which was targeted at flood alleviation and relief, and some at mitigating the financial impact on residents and businesses. While this was welcomed and well intentioned, it was confusing because residents especially were not sure which fund they were supposed to apply to for relief and sometimes they did not qualify for one fund but did for another. It was all very confusing at a time of great stress. I hope that in future there will be greater clarity.

In Somerset, all the agencies worked together and produced a flood action plan. I do not share the misgivings and pessimism of the noble Baroness about that. This was published in February 2014, having been given a very tight timetable by central government. This was an extensive piece of work and covered both soft and hard measures to secure alleviation of the effects of flooding. This area of Somerset is never going to be entirely free from flooding. It is a given by the very nature of the area. However, mitigation is key.

There were six objectives in the flood action plan: reduce the frequency, depth and duration of flooding; maintain access for communities and businesses; increase resilience to flooding for families, agriculture, businesses, communities and wildlife; make the most of the special characteristics of the Somerset Levels and moors; ensure strategic transport connectivity, both within Somerset and through the county to the south-west peninsula; and promote business confidence and growth. This was a very big ask after such devastation. However, work has continued and the progress update in September showed that much had been achieved against targets and more work should be completed shortly.

The first eight kilometres of the Tone and Parrett rivers have now been dredged by the Environment Agency—a long overdue measure—and the capacity of the King’s Sedgemoor Drain is to be increased. Somerset County Council will undertake appropriate roadworks to allow the river Sowy channel to be widened and will install locking gates on roads that regularly flood to prevent drivers becoming stranded. The construction of a barrier or sluice at Bridgwater will be speeded up, with the objective of achieving delivery by 2024. That sounds a long way off but it is a big project.

The newly established Somerset rivers board will have greater control and responsibility for work to maintain and improve water management on the Levels and moors. This is a key step forward. It is essential that those on the ground who know the area and have done so for many years are the ones who should take control and ownership of what happens. Only then will we see sustainable solutions coming forward.

Community resilience will also be important in future years. In Moorland, hundreds of volunteers from all over the country arrived to assist local residents. Such were their numbers, they completely overwhelmed local agencies. At the time, there was no system in place for dealing with the numbers and no structures to ensure that their time and energy were used to best effect. The Somerset Emergency Volunteers, under the auspices of the South Somerset Association for Voluntary and Community Action and in conjunction with local district councils, came to the rescue. Everyone in the area owes a great debt of gratitude both to the volunteers who arrived in such numbers to help and to the SSVCA for organising that help so efficiently.

Last Monday evening, South Somerset District Council held a flooding reassurance meeting for all those who had been affected. More than 100 people turned up. The highlight of the evening was undoubtedly the Environment Agency team and its illustrations, which clearly and simply explained how the water on the Levels and moors was managed and where the key trigger points were for operating pumps and sluices, to prevent widespread flooding beyond the system’s originally designed capacity. All this is good news, but it will not solve the problem by a long way.

In his Statement in the other place on 6 March this year, the Secretary of State reported that 7,000 properties across England had been flooded during the winter. On 30 October, in answer to a Written Question, the Minister for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs responded that £3.2 billion would have been spent on flood defences over the course of this Parliament, compared to £2.7 billion over the previous five years, and that since 2010, the level of protection had been improved to more than 165,000 households. It seems as though the problem is being given a high priority, but I worry that the money available will be put into hard construction solutions, instead of softer measures, such as dredging. I would be grateful if the Minister could comment on how this money will be allocated and spent.