Flooding: Planning and Developer Responsibilities

Steff Aquarone Excerpts

Tuesday 13th May 2025 Westminster Hall

[Steff Aquarone (North Norfolk) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) on securing the debate. As in much of the country, we in North Norfolk have been told by the Government that we need to identify significantly more sites for housing. Let me be absolutely clear: we do need more homes, including homes that local people can actually afford, so that they are not stuck waiting endlessly on housing lists or left in temporary accommodation, but rushing to build homes without proper provision for flood alleviation or sustainable drainage would be a bad idea and incredibly costly. Let us imagine a young couple who, after years of saving and planning, finally moving into their first home, but it floods because corners were cut and developers were not held to account. That is not just a policy failure; it is a failure of basic fairness.

That failure does not just affect new homeowners. If we add more pressure to our creaking infrastructure without investment, we risk backed-up drains and flooding for the people who have lived in those communities for years. The previous Government promised to implement schedule 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, which would require developers to include sustainable drainage systems, but they never delivered.

One place that would benefit hugely from such a system is Ludham where, following the Government’s new mandated targets, a development proposal for 12 houses has expanded to 60 houses. That has caused significant concern for locals due to the history of flooding in the area. If it were to go ahead, it could be feasible only with real action on the surface water and drainage issues that the area faces.

Although North Norfolk district council does an excellent job of pushing developers as hard as it can, it needs the Government to provide it with the legislative teeth to achieve more. I hope that the Minister is in conversation with her counterparts at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government about how we make sure that there is joined-up thinking about flooding in future planning legislation.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

Hawkhurst parish council and Southern Water recently came to see me to complain about a number of developers in my constituency who have mixed surface run-off with foul water, which is illegal. Does my hon. Friend agree that, although we of course need big housing developments, if developers are proven to have illegally mixed surface run-off and foul water when building them, they should have to make good what they did?

[Steff Aquarone]

Unquestionably, and a slightly more sympathetic approach should be taken to historical instances in which householders’ surface water drains have been connected to foul water systems, which they may not even realise. For developments that have been built since that law, it is absolutely unquestionable that developers should do that.

Finally, we must consider seriously the impact of man-made climate change on flooding. When we place responsibilities on developers, we must make sure that new developments do not deal just with the floods of the past or those of today, but with the worst floods that are yet to come. Henry Cator is chair of the Norfolk Strategic Flooding Alliance, which my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk, mentioned. His voice is given deserved reverence in Norfolk when speaking about these issues, and he has said that climate change will create a new level of extremes that we must be ready for. Simply planning for the current levels will be wasted in years to come.

I look forward to working with hon. Members on both sides of the House on this issue. It needs proper cross-functional work from the Government if we are to ensure that the much-needed homes of tomorrow are built sustainably and that the circumstances of the communities that those houses will serve and join are protected and improved.

[Several hon. Members rose—]