8 March 2011
Following his intervention in in a debate on the Funding of Flood Risk Management in Parliament last month Cotswold MP, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, has received assurance from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) that they will be reviewing the system used to allocate funding to flood defence schemes.
During the debate last month Mr Clifton-Brown commented in response to a letter from the Environment Agency,
“It is easy to come up with statistics to show, in order of priority, which projects will give the best value for money and save the most houses. The problem in a highly rural constituency such as the Cotswolds, which has 110 villages, lots of which have flooding problems, is that it will never meet those criteria. Most of my constituency-with the exception of Cirencester, which flooded in 2000, 2007 and 2008-will never get any funding under the system. I accept that my hon. Friend the Minister has a limited pot of funding, but I ask him to look at the system of allocation.”
The Minister, unfortunately, did not have time to respond on this point and Mr Clifton-Brown subsequently wrote to Richard Benyon MP, the Minister responsible for flooding at DEFRA, to ask him to review the system of allocation.
In his response to Mr Clifton-Brown the Minister confirmed that DEFRA will be reviewing the current system. In the letter the Minister stated:
“Under the current system, there is no explicit bias against rural projects, but it is true that projects are less likely to go ahead in sparsely populated areas as these will tend to score less highly than projects which protect larger numbers of people or higher asset values for a given cost.”
“I recognise the uncertainty this creates for schemes across the country, where something clearly needs to be done”
“That is why I propose to change the system. DEFRA is consulting on reforming the way in which national funding is allocated to individual projects. The new proposal moves away from meet the full costs of a limited number of scheme, to paying for a share of the benefits achieved when outcomes are delivered – over time potentially in every case.”
Responding to this news Mr Clifton-Brown commented, “I certainly welcome the Government’s decision to review its system for the allocation of funding of flood defences.”
“Under the current system it is almost impossible for schemes in rural places like the Cotswolds to receive funding for flood defences.”
“Under the new system that is being proposed funding for schemes in the Cotswold will be more readily available. However, under this new system of allocation the Environment Agency will not provide funding to cover the full costs of schemes. This will mean that external funding will need to be found.”
“In the current climate this will be difficult, however, this set of circumstances is a significant improvement and I am hopeful that funding for flood defence schemes in the Cotswold will be more easily accessible than in the past.”
During the debate last month Mr Clifton-Brown commented in response to a letter from the Environment Agency,
“It is easy to come up with statistics to show, in order of priority, which projects will give the best value for money and save the most houses. The problem in a highly rural constituency such as the Cotswolds, which has 110 villages, lots of which have flooding problems, is that it will never meet those criteria. Most of my constituency-with the exception of Cirencester, which flooded in 2000, 2007 and 2008-will never get any funding under the system. I accept that my hon. Friend the Minister has a limited pot of funding, but I ask him to look at the system of allocation.”
The Minister, unfortunately, did not have time to respond on this point and Mr Clifton-Brown subsequently wrote to Richard Benyon MP, the Minister responsible for flooding at DEFRA, to ask him to review the system of allocation.
In his response to Mr Clifton-Brown the Minister confirmed that DEFRA will be reviewing the current system. In the letter the Minister stated:
“Under the current system, there is no explicit bias against rural projects, but it is true that projects are less likely to go ahead in sparsely populated areas as these will tend to score less highly than projects which protect larger numbers of people or higher asset values for a given cost.”
“I recognise the uncertainty this creates for schemes across the country, where something clearly needs to be done”
“That is why I propose to change the system. DEFRA is consulting on reforming the way in which national funding is allocated to individual projects. The new proposal moves away from meet the full costs of a limited number of scheme, to paying for a share of the benefits achieved when outcomes are delivered – over time potentially in every case.”
Responding to this news Mr Clifton-Brown commented, “I certainly welcome the Government’s decision to review its system for the allocation of funding of flood defences.”
“Under the current system it is almost impossible for schemes in rural places like the Cotswolds to receive funding for flood defences.”
“Under the new system that is being proposed funding for schemes in the Cotswold will be more readily available. However, under this new system of allocation the Environment Agency will not provide funding to cover the full costs of schemes. This will mean that external funding will need to be found.”
“In the current climate this will be difficult, however, this set of circumstances is a significant improvement and I am hopeful that funding for flood defence schemes in the Cotswold will be more easily accessible than in the past.”
