UK still at risk following flooding

Floods which swept the UK last summer exposed the "vulnerability of the nation’s critical infrastructure", according to a government report released today.

Furthermore, the government's initial response and subsequent action have been insufficient to avoid a repeat of such a catastrophe, finds the report.

The floods - which affected vast swathes of England and Wales, in June and July 2007 - were on a scale not seen in this country for 60 years.

Some 44,600 homes were flooded, along with 7,100 businesses which were damaged – at a total cost of £3 billion to the UK economy. At least 13 people also lost their lives.

Yorkshire & the Humber, the Midlands and Gloucestershire were among the worst affected areas after heavy rain broke flood defences following heavy rain.

Nine months on, despite an awareness of the problems caused by surface water flooding, "no organisation currently has responsibility" for the problem, at either the national or local level.

Despite government assurances it will increase expenditure on flood risk management from £600 million in 2007–08 to £800 million by 2010–11, as part of its Comprehensive Spending Review 2007 settlement, the report argues current provisions are remain "unclear and chaotic".

The report also describes funding as "inadequate" to cope with the threat of flooding, especially as this danger increases with the onset of global warming.

As part of its 41 point conclusion, the report recommends the Environment Agency take the lead in dealing with the concerns, but rejects the notion of a dedicated flood agency on the grounds of cost.

If the government failed to take "comprehensive and well funded", action to correct the flaws exposed by the report the public would not forgiving, said the committee's chairman Michael Jack.

Worryingly, the UK could also be verging on a period of increased flooding and extreme weather conditions, warn experts.

According to analysis of long-term river flow and rainfall records dating from 1853, the UK is entering a flood-rich period after 30 to 40 less eventful years, Professor Stuart Lane, of the Institute of Hazard and Risk Research at Durham University, told BBC Radio 4's 'Today' programme.

"One of the things we're not very good at doing I think is looking over much longer periods of time in analysing our rainfall and river flow records," he explained.

"Certainly when you look back over long periods you do find that we have these what you might call flood-rich periods and we have these flood-poor periods.

"We seem to have had a particularly flood-poor period from round about the 1960s through until round about the 1990s."

Chris O'Toole