Thames Barrier

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch Excerpts

Wednesday 27th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I shall certainly raise this with my noble friend in the Department of Energy and Climate Change. Clearly it is important that in this country we use many sources of alternative energy supply, and that is a very interesting concept.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that the barrier is increasingly being used to protect properties in the Thames valley to the west which are being threatened by rising river levels due to the unprecedented rainfall and not for its original purpose, which was to stop tidal surges from the river mouth to the east? It is now performing a very different function. Given the concerns that have been raised around the Chamber, there is concern that we are being complacent and that there is a further need to evaluate the risk if anything should go wrong. The national flood resilience review that has just been announced is to be chaired by Oliver Letwin. I thought that it was to review all our flood defences. Will it include a specific look at the Thames Barrier? If we are not careful and follow the line the noble Lord has taken there will be one review of the Thames Barrier and everything else will be looked at elsewhere whereas what we need is a concerted response to the whole attack.

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, I am very pleased to confirm to the noble Baroness that with the Thames Barrier being a very important part of our national resilience infrastructure it will form part of any consideration chaired by Oliver Letwin to ensure that we are secure.

The noble Baroness is right that the Thames Barrier is used for tidal and fluvial reasons, but last year it was used only once and that was for tidal. It was used a lot during the big floods of 2013-14.