Winter Floods Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Lord King of Bridgwater
Main Page: Lord King of Bridgwater (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord King of Bridgwater's debates with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord King of Bridgwater (Con)
Having listened to the statement made from the opposition Front Bench in another place, perhaps I may say how much I preferred the response of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and his constructive approach to this very serious issue. He has the advantage of actually knowing something about the subject.
The most worrying sentence in this Statement is:
“We will continue to face severe weather well into next week”.
And no one knows what it is going to be like after that. Anyone who is familiar with the current state of the Somerset Levels will know how that water is spreading and how the situation is deteriorating in certain areas as the water moves around. I am all in favour of sensible, constructive meetings of COBRA but it is the co-ordination on the ground that is extremely important. I appreciate the Prime Minister’s personal efforts and I know that the Prime Minister and the Government are now fully focused on this, but I hope that the sympathy will not go when the floods go down. In certain respects, there could be a serious health problem. A number of septic tanks and parts of the sewerage system are not working and problems may arise with rotting vegetation. I hope that the concentration of the Government will not end when the floods disappear but will remain totally focused on what will clearly be a very serious situation for some time to come.
Lord De Mauley
I absolutely endorse my noble friend’s point about the importance of local co-ordination on the ground. My impression is that that is making considerable progress and I congratulate those who are involved.
My noble friend’s reference to ongoing attention—to Somerset, for example—I endorse as well. I must say that we should not lose sight of the other places that have suffered from flooding during this spate of weather. I shall not name any of them because I will forget to include some, but there are many places around the country which have suffered.