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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if his Department will make an assessment of the potential (a) merits of establishing a Flood Defence Agency as a standalone arms-length body and (b) implications for (i) budget allocations and (ii) operational efficiency of such a body.

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.