Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the Environment Agency is permitted to register property owners along the tidal Thames as riparian owners where legal evidence of ownership does not exist.

The Environment Agency does not register landowners in London as riparian owners. A landowner’s responsibility for a tidal flood defence arises under the Metropolis Management (Thames River Prevention of Floods) Amendment Act 1879, which requires flood defences to be created and maintained to a defined height (relative to ordnance datum) in order to protect London from flooding and inundations caused by overflows from the River Thames.