Action needed to improve flood defences - MP

The government has been urged to take action on flood defences following the widespread flooding cause by Storm Bert.

Labour's Environment Secretary Steve Reed said last week the Conservatives left defences “in their worst condition on record” and his party was investing £2.4bn over two years to upgrade defences.

But Liberal Democrat MP Cameron Thomas told BBC Politics Midlands it was a nationally strategic issue and urged the government to “grab it by the horns”.

While Bromsgrove’s Tory MP Bradley Thomas said there had been a rise in severe weather events and defended the previous government’s work.

Last month's storms saw severe floods across the West Midlands in particular in Tenbury Wells, Worcestershire, after a wall collapsed.

Schools and roads in Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Shropshire were closed by the flooding following the downpours.

Rail services were also cancelled between Shrewsbury and Wales and the line to Birmingham was blocked.

The Conservative MP said his colleague, Dame Harriett Baldwin, the MP for West Worcestershire, had secured £7.5m over the years for a flood defence scheme in Tenbury which was on the cusp of being delivered - and the previous government had delivered on defences in Bewdley.

He added the Tory administration at the time had also pledged £5.4bn for 2021-27 for flood defences and it was not clear whether funding announced by Mr Reed was part of that.

Criticising housebuilding targets set by Labour, the former Wychavon council leader said: “They’ve increased our housing allocation by 82% whilst dropping the Birmingham one by 20%. That risks exacerbating rural flooding even further.”

But Labour’s MP for Stourbridge, Cat Eccles, told the BBC: “It’s great that they had all that funding for flooding, but why wasn’t anything done? They had 14 years to do so.”

On planning, she said: “We need to be looking at when we’re redeveloping that national planning framework that we are considering flood plain risks and where we’re concreting over and taking trees out.

“Ultimately, these are the things that absorb the water – trees, ground, grass – and just being a bit more mindful about how we do planning in the future, while also meeting the housing targets.”

Speaking on Politics Midlands, the Lib Dem Tewkesbury MP said two rivers - the Severn and Avon – bordered his constituency and Tewkesbury regularly flooded as well as other parishes.

He said one issue in Tewkesbury was tributaries combining which made flooding worse, which could also be affected by the use of defences upstream.

“We are really desperate for a nationally strategic flooding review,” he said.

“This is a far more nationally strategic issue and it needs this current government now to grab it by the horns.”

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