Flooding

Sarah Dyke Excerpts

Monday 6th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Sarah Dyke (Glastonbury and Somerton) (LD)]

Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent. New Environment Agency modelling shows that one in four properties in England, including an additional 39,000 homes in the south-west, could be at risk of flooding by 2050.

Like many across Glastonbury and Somerton, I watch this happen in real time. Residents are on high alert, they are anxious and their mental health is suffering. Knole is a small hamlet between Langport and Somerton that previously never flooded, but last winter nine homes flooded every month. With just 40 houses in the hamlet, such incidents have a huge impact on the local community. One affected resident told me they had to watch the ingress of water through every wall in their house. Another said they were unable to return home until mid-summer after last year’s winter flooding. Their experiences and those of many residents across Somerset, and those set out in the national flood risk assessment, show that heavier rainfall and rising sea levels already threaten 2.4 million properties, so will the Minister commit to ensuring that agencies such as Natural England and the Environment Agency are properly funded to deal with flooding and future flooding?

[Emma Hardy]

The hon. Lady is right to point out the impact on people’s mental health. I urge her to invite communities that experience repeated flooding to look at the Build Back Better scheme. They could be able to access an extra £10,000 to make their homes more resilient to flooding. As I said, this is something that I care deeply about, as does the Department, which is why we are investing £2.4 billion in delivering, improving and maintaining flood defences.