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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what weighting (a) his Department and (b) the Environment Agency give to world heritage site status when determining funding for flood defences.

The impacts of coastal erosion and flooding on heritage assets are included in the economic impacts assessment for flood and coastal erosion schemes. Last year, the Environment Agency published the Environment and Historic Environment Outcomes Valuation Guidance which contains specific arrangements for the valuation of heritage assets such as religious buildings.

Flood schemes protecting world heritage sites attract funding through the Government’s Partnership Funding Policy. The amount of funding a project can attract will depend on the damages it will avoid and the benefits it will deliver, including those to heritage assets.