Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Environment Agency in managing flood defences in the last five years; and if he will make made an assessment of the potential merits of establishing (a) a dedicated flood defence agency and (b) other models of flood management oversight.

Protecting communities from flooding is a key priority for this Government. Defra has recently established a Flood Resilience Taskforce which brings together local, regional and national government and organisations including from the voluntary and insurance sectors to improve resilience and preparedness in England.

The role of the EA, Local Authorities and other flood risk management authorities in incident management is set out in the Flood & Water Management Act 2010.

Defra has not assessed the adequacy of international flood defence agencies. It is not the role of Defra to assess the effectiveness of agencies of other countries.