A shorter version of this appears in the current issue of Sustainable Building
Despite a
succession of ministers, including David
Cameron, insisting resources for flood defences and mitigation have grown
under the Coalition Government, MPs on the Environment
Select Committee - under Conservative chair Anne McIntosh - issued a waspish new report on 7 January, asking
under pressure environment secretary Owen
Patterson, to clarify how planned spending cuts in Defra will impact future
flood management.
Mr Patterson
told MPs this week that “about 5 million properties in England are at risk of
flooding.”
Launching its report,
Anne McIntosh said: “Defra is a
small ministry facing massive budget cuts and which relies on a large number of
arms-length bodies to deliver many significant areas of policy. Ministers must
clarify how further budgets cuts of over £300 million over the coming 2 years
will impact on the funding provided to these agencies and the ability of the
Department to respond to emergencies.”
Meanwhile, the
long-running dispute over who should pay for the flood maintenance storage
charge has burst into the public, three years after the outgoing Labour
Government legislated for the
implementation of sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) for new housing
development in the Flood Act 2010.
The BBC reported that housebuilders insist it will put up the cost of
new homes and have been wrangling with government and councils over who pays to
maintain new systems. The broadcaster says it understands that a deal has now
been struck, which is likely to see councils annually billing the owners of
newly built homes for maintaining flood-prevention measures like ponds and
hollows in the land designed to trap water.
Last summer MPs on the Environment
Select committee demanded that ministers should introduce the SUDS rules
immediately, but the government said it would delay doing so until this April.
This has now been further delayed until this summer.
Paul Shaffer
from Susdrain, the community for
sustainable drainage, based at the construction research institute CIRIA, told BBC News: "The greatest
benefits are likely to be if the water is captured on the surface. In some
places it won't be appropriate, but generally it's a more simple solution
that's easier to maintain. You get pollutants broken down free of charge by
vegetation, you get amenity value that improves people's quality of lives, you
help to improve biodiversity, you also get the benefit that in heatwaves the
open areas of water help to cool down the surrounding land.”
But house builders say these
features should not be mandatory because they take land which would otherwise
be used for homes, and this increases the cost of house-building.
Professor Richard Ashley,
an expert in urban water management at Sheffield
University, observed the situation is “Ridiculous. The house builders are
lobbying furiously behind the scenes.”
Local Government Association spokesman Councillor
Mike Jones added: "The developers should be able to pay for the works
that are needed. They are making very healthy profits."
In a
Parliamentary discussion** on the impact of flooding 6 January Green MP Dr Caroline Lucas asked Mr Patterson
why under his leadership of Defra he has seen the decision to slash Defra’s
team working on climate change adaptation from 38 officials to six and when at
the same time Communities Secretary Eric
Pickles has scrapped the obligation for councils to prepare for the impacts
of climate change? She demanded: “will the Secretary of State not acknowledge
that that illustrates an incredibly reckless approach to the risks that extreme
weather presents”?
At Environment Questions
on 9 January Labour MP Hugh Bayley, who represents York Central, an area prone
to urban flooding, challenged the environment secretary over his repeated
insistence that the £2.3 billion due to be
spent in the six-year
period from 2015-16 by the coalition on flood protection is a bigger sum that spent by Labour,
arguing that in an earlier Parliamentary
answer on 15 July last year revealed Defra’s
spending on flood protection in England fell from £646 million in 2010-11 to £533
million in 2013-14.
In a written reply on 9 January Communities floods minister, Brandon
Lewis, said as of 8 January, Defra had received 22 notifications from local
authorities that they intend to make a claim under the Bellwin Scheme – which provides emergency financial assistance to
local authorities to help them meet uninsurable costs they incur when
responding to a major emergency in their area - for the recent severe weather
events.
Speaking at
Prime Minister’s question time in Parliament on 8 January, Mr Cameron confirmed
the scope of the flood threat saying there were “currently 104 flood warnings
in place across the whole of England and Wales. That means, sadly, that more
flooding is expected and that immediate action is required. There are also 186
flood alerts, which means even further flooding is possible beyond what we
expect to happen more rapidly
He added “On
the positive side, the Environment
Agency warning service worked better than it has in the past and the flood
defences protected up to a million homes over the December and Christmas
period, but there are some negatives, too, and we need to learn lessons from
them.”
He also said he
agreed that “we are seeing more abnormal
weather events. Colleagues across the House can argue about whether that is
linked to climate change or not; I very much suspect that it is. The point is
that, whatever one’s view, it makes sense to invest in flood defences and mitigation
and to get information out better, and we should do all of those things.”
Asked by Labour leader, Ed Miliband if he would commit to Defra “providing a report by
the end of this month, providing a full assessment of the future capability of
our flood defences and flood response agencies and of whether the investment
plans in place are equal to the need for events of this kind?”, Mr Cameron
responded he would be “very happy to make that commitment.”
He also
stressed that in addition to Government money, ministers “ are keen to lever in
more private sector and local authority money, which is now possible under the
arrangements.”
Mr Patterson
said in Environment Question Time on 9 January that “thanks to the fact that we have galvanised
local councils through the partnership funding scheme, there will be all sorts
of opportunities for ..local council(s) to access more funds for flood schemes.”
He added “In November, it was found that 97% of the defences were in a good
condition and would remain so within our existing budgets.”
But
Shadow environment secretary, Maria
Eagle challenged the environment secretary, asking: ”When he became Secretary of State in
September 2012, (he) reviewed his Department’s priorities. Why did his new list
of four priorities make no reference to preparing for and managing risks from
flood and other environmental emergencies, as the old list of priorities and
responsibilities had done?”, to be told “My first priority is to grow the rural
economy, and I am delighted to say that our ambitious schemes will help to do
that,” adding “Dear, oh dear, this is lame stuff. We are spending £2.3 billion
over the course of this Parliament, with £148 million of partnership money. We
have an extra £5 million for revenue, and in the course of the recent reduction
across Departments I specifically excluded flood defence, so the reduction is
spread across the rest of Defra.”
Efra select committee critique of
Defra annual report
Pointing to the
recent flooding events over the Christmas and New year period, Committee chair
Anne McIntosh insisted it reinforced the Committee's “concerns about cuts to
the Defra budget and how these will be realised. The Environment Agency is set
to lose 1700 jobs in the next 12 months,“ pointing out “We have asked the Department to confirm the
amount of contributions received from external sources under the Partnership
Funding approach and to demonstrate how the Partnership Funding model for flood
defences will deliver much greater private sector funding in the future. This
will allow the drainage boards to do more of the essential maintenance work of
main watercourses using their own resources.”
The MPs
said that while they “understand that nearly all Government departments face
budget cuts,” they also insisted that “savings must not have an adverse impact
on the Department's ability to respond to emergencies.” They invited Defra to set out its position in
relation to reported reductions in staff at the Environment Agency and Defra’s
research body, the Food and Environment Research Agency( Fera).
|
They
add that since the committee took evidence, “we have learnt that the
Government will undertake a 'market sounding' exercise to explore joint
venture as a potential future business model Fera The Government says that an
external partner who has the necessary expertise and experience could help
Fera "further develop and grow non-government revenue". It will
announce the future of Fera at the end of the financial year.
|
The impact of spending reviews
The MPs set out that Defra’s budget,
described as the Departmental Expenditure Limit (DEL) for its strategic
objectives in 2012-13, was £2.5 billion, which has been reduced by £500 million since the
2010 Spending Review and will reduce further by £300 million by 2015-16, which
“represents one of the largest budget reductions in percentage terms for any
Department, prompting questions about the Department's ability to manage its
remit.” They added on 5 December, in the Autumn Statement, and subsequent to
the Committee’s evidence sessions, additional reductions in Defra's resource
(non-capital) budget of £19 million in 2014-15 and £18 million in 2015-16 were
announced.Table 1: Reductions in total DEL expenditure
|
DEFRA BUDGET CUTS SINCE 2010/11
|
|
£bn
|
2010/11
|
2012/13
|
2015/16
|
|
TOTAL
|
3.0
|
2.5
|
2.2
|
|
%real-change from 2010/11
|
|
-21%
|
-36.4%
|
In June 2013 the Treasury announced that Defra was
expected to save £54 million by 2015-16 through better joint working between
the Department's delivery bodies under the Strategic Alignment programme, but
they also note that the Environment Secretary “did not provide us with any
detail on which aspects of Departmental activity would bear the brunt of the
savings.”
The MPs conclude that the Secretary of State “needs to be clearer about
what substantial cuts in Defra's budget will mean for policy delivery. …We
invite the Secretary of State to set out in detail, in response to this Report,
what programmes and policies will be reduced or ended to meet the required budget
savings.”
The MPs note that “there have been
reports that the Environment Agency, which is responsible for responding to
floods, is expected to lose about 1,700 jobs in the next 12 months.”
George Eustice, Conservative Defra minister for water
and rural affairs, said in response to criticisms of Defra cuts that the cuts
had not impacted on flood defences, stressing: “The £300 million cut is a cut
to Defra’s overall budget. Within that, what we’ve actually said we’ll do is
prioritise spending on flood defence – that’s why we’re going to be spending
more in the next spending review period on flood defence than we have in the
previous one.”
He also suggested
that the Environment Agency cuts might have made the organisation more
efficient, pointing out “It’s important to remember that sometimes having cuts
in budgets can drive change and cause governments to look at doing things
differently. In the case of the Environment Agency, they cut back office admin
costs by about a third.”
But Guy Shrubsole, a Friends of the Earth
climate campaigner, countered: “Protecting British households from the
destructive impacts of climate change is essential. The Prime Minister must
intervene to ensure flood defence spending rises to meet the challenge.”
Trades Unions also
urged the government to reverse the job losses at the Environment Agency, with Leslie Manasseh, the deputy general
secretary of the Prospect union asserting: “They need to learn the lessons of
the experiences of this winter, which have had such a devastating impact on so
many people.”
Paul Leinster, the EA's chief executive said:
"The EA has to save money and reduce staff numbers, like the rest of the
public sector. We are looking to protect frontline services and our ability to
respond to flooding when it occurs."
Defra floods minister Dan Rogerson published details in a written
answer on 6 January of the number of staff employed directly by the Environment
Agency in flood alleviation works in each of the last three years :
|
|
Number of staff
|
|
2011-12
|
3,099
|
|
2012-13
|
3,169
|
|
2013-14 (to Q2)
|
2,997
|
Charles Tucker, chairman of the National Flood Forum,added: "It's about joined-up thinking.
With joined-up thinking, you don't cut the staff at the EA who manage flooding
and maintain flood assets. With joined-up thinking, you don't keep cutting
local council capability to deal with the new flooding responsibilities they've
been given."
Ø
Meanwhile, Utility Week has revealed*** a
whistleblower as accused the Environment Agency ' of abuses public funds,
reporting that the Agency is under pressure from anonymous allegations of
abusing public funds at the same time as its depleted workforce try to tackle
widespread flooding.
An ex-employee, who identified himself only as
“Henry”, earlier this month launched a blog painting a picture of endemic fraud, bullying
and mismanagement in the Agency, in nearly 30 posts, all dated January 2014.
Henry told Utility Week he had lodged a complaint with Paul
Leinster.
