Environment Agency

[BrilloPad]

pj, I don't mean to be unkind, but you are irrelevant in this discussion. we don't need your religious mumbo jumbo

Who appointed you moderator?

Posting total nonsense is not a barrier to anyone posting on CUK usually......

[pjclarke]

>> There was an EU ruling a number of years ago about not being able to dredge local watercourses for fear of endangering various creatures habitats thus these water courses now have a reduced capacity and so flood more easily.

Not sure about that. They used to flood onto low value farmland, the main effect of canalisation, straightening and dredging is to enable the water to get into the urban pinchpoints more rapidly and flood people's houses.

Drainage boards, that are public bodies but tend to be mostly controlled by landowners, often prioritise the protection of farmland above the safety of towns and cities downstream. By straightening, embanking and dredging rivers where they cut through fields, drainage boards accelerate the flow of water, making flooding downstream more likely. When heavy rain falls, some land must flood. We have a choice: fields or cities; and all over Britain we have chosen badly. […]

Building higher walls will not, by itself, protect our towns. We need flood prevention as well as flood defence. This means woodland and functioning bogs on the hills. It means dead wood and gravel banks and other such obstructions in the upper reaches of the streams (beavers will do such work for nothing). It means pulling down embankments to reconnect rivers to their floodplains, flooding fields instead of towns. It means allowing rivers to meander and braid. It means creating buffer zones around their banks: places where trees, shrubs, reeds and long grass are allowed to grow, providing what engineers call hydraulic roughness. It means the opposite of the orgy of self-destruction that decades of government and European policy have encouraged: grazing, mowing, burning, draining, canalisation and dredging.

Going Downhill Fast | George Monbiot

[SueEllen]

Why is it the Tories fault??

It's the Tories fault because they have formed the government in full or part since 2010.

They therefore could have said any building on flood plains is not allowed plus lots of other measures.

They could have also not cut the budgets of the EA, army and emergency services.

They should have had an agreement with insurers to insure those in regions prone to flooding before the last agreement ran out.

Oh and stop blaming the EU for British governments, regardless of political party, incompetence. Those in charge, in all parties, help formulate the rules so if they put in things they don't know how to work around then they weren't paying attention when their civil servants briefed them.

Anyway I didn't vote for that band of eejits....

[pjclarke]

They should have had an agreement with insurers to insure those in regions prone to flooding before the last agreement ran out.

True dat. Flood Re is going to be nearly a year late.

Flood Re: Government insurance scheme launch confirmed for 2016 - Telegraph

[original PM]

It's the Tories fault because they have formed the government in full or part since 2010.

They therefore could have said any building on flood plains is not allowed plus lots of other measures.

They could have also not cut the budgets of the EA, army and emergency services.

They should have had an agreement with insurers to insure those in regions prone to flooding before the last agreement ran out.

Oh and stop blaming the EU for British governments, regardless of political party, incompetence. Those in charge, in all parties, help formulate the rules so if they put in things they don't know how to work around then they weren't paying attention when their civil servants briefed them.

Anyway I didn't vote for that band of eejits....

So flooding only started in 2010 - why was it not the fault of the previous government for sorting it out.

More to the point why are the people who live on flood plains not doing something - like moving for instance instead of sitting there looking shocked when they get flooded ... again.

Why should the government stop people building on flood plains? maybe it would be better if you let them then if people had half a fookin brain they would know not to buy the house as it may have a risk of flooding and therefore over time people would stop buying houses on flood plains - we need to stop expecting the government to tell us what we do and protect us from our own basic stupidity.

[SueEllen]

So flooding only started in 2010 - why was it not the fault of the previous government for sorting it out.

More to the point why are the people who live on flood plains not doing something - like moving for instance instead of sitting there looking shocked when they get flooded ... again.

Why should the government stop people building on flood plains? maybe it would be better if you let them then if people had half a fookin brain they would know not to buy the house as it may have a risk of flooding and therefore over time people would stop buying houses on flood plains - we need to stop expecting the government to tell us what we do and protect us from our own basic stupidity.

Tories have been in power since 2010 and have cut budgets for the agencies that deal with flooding.

The Tories were the ones who delayed the insurance scheme. Labour had one in place that ran out, and whoever was elected in 2010 knew they had to agree a new one.

If the Tories had allowed previous governments plans to go through while we would be in a mess, the mess would be smaller.

Also it is not as simple as only those on flood plains being effected. Some housing is not on a flood plain but due to developers being allowed to build new properties on flood plains now get flooded. So now both old and new properties get flooded. I use to live two streets away from such an area.

[darmstadt]

Oh, I forgot: