Oral Answers to Questions

Patrick Hurley Excerpts

Thursday 20th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner]

As I said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Noah Law), the first thing we needed to do was establish how much we are actually buying, and that is now in progress. I absolutely get the point about the urgency. The question is why doing this took the previous Government so long when they shared our ambition. We are determined to make this happen.

[Patrick Hurley (Southport) (Lab)]

10. What steps he has taken to help protect communities that are vulnerable to flooding.

[Jo Platt (Leigh and Atherton) (Lab/Co-op)]

12. What steps he has taken to help protect communities that are vulnerable to flooding.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Hardy)]

Repairing and rebuilding our flood defences is a priority for this Labour Government, and we are investing at a record level to improve flood resilience, better protecting 52,000 properties by this time next year.

[Patrick Hurley]

The Environment Agency allocates its budgets to carry out work on flood defences on the basis of a funding formula, but that formula does not give sufficient weight to agricultural land. Will the Minister undertake a review of the formula, so that agricultural land gets the flood defences it needs?

[Emma Hardy]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this important issue. I completely agree that the previous flooding formula did not work for rural communities, which is exactly why we are consulting to change it. The consultation will be announced shortly, and I encourage him and every Member across the House to get involved in shaping the formula, so we can make sure it delivers the right outcomes for everybody up and down our country.