Flood damage could make football club 'go bust'

A football club has warned it could go bust if it keeps having to foot the cost of repairing flood damage.

Non-league Tadcaster Albion's home ground, which is situated next to the River Wharfe, was under water six times last season and chairman Andy Charlesworth said it had left them with bills of £100,000.

He has joined the Common Grounds campaign, which demands more action from politicians to protect sports facilities from extreme weather as a result of climate change.

Mr Charlesworth said the club, which was founded in 1892, would "really, really struggle" without financial support for flooding, adding: "We could go out of business and just disappear."

According to the Common Grounds campaign, 120,000 football matches are postponed every season due to flooding.

It has called on sports fans and participants to contact their MPs and urge them "to champion action that is good for people, nature and the climate".

Mr Charlesworth said: “Our grassroots sports clubs add so much to our communities but they are the ones most affected and least able to recover from the effects of climate change."

Ninth-tier Tadcaster have raised the height of their clubhouse by 70cm and added floodgates to help mitigate the risks they face.

Mr Charlesworth said they had been unable to get insurance because of their history of flooding, while attempts to find land for a new pitch have also proved fruitless.

He claimed the installation of long-awaited flood defences in the town "will stop 99% of all floods from affecting our ground", if the plans were approved by North Yorkshire Council.

Mr Charlesworth said flooding at the ground had been getting "more severe, but also the frequency has been getting a lot worse".

"We can't sustain each year putting money into the club just to resolve the flooding.

"We would rather be putting money into the club to move it forward."

A spokesperson for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: “Protecting communities from flooding is a priority for the government, which is why we have launched our new Flood Resilience Taskforce to improve flood resilience and preparedness and will turbocharge the delivery and repair of flood defences”.

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