Flood Control: Local Government
(asked on 19th January 2023) - View Source
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will take steps to ensure that local authorities have access to relevant (a) information and (b) expertise to assist with natural flood management strategies.
Answered by
Rebecca Pow
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
One of the 5 policy areas in the Government policy statement on flooding and coastal erosion is ‘Harnessing the power of nature to reduce flood and coastal erosion risk and achieve multiple benefits’.
The Environment Agency (EA)’s Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management (FCERM) Roadmap to 2026 includes ambitions to work with partners to mainstream Natural Flood Management (NFM) across England.
The EA will publish an update to the Working with Natural Processes Evidence Directory later this year. It will continue to gather data and evidence from Natural Flood Management Projects to inform learning and best practice.
Alongside these actions to support partners, the EA has published an evaluation of the Natural Flood Management Programme which benefited from £15 million of Government funding. Local authorities were one of a number of partner organisations involved in the pilot schemes.
The EA will support all bodies with flood and coastal erosion risk management responsibilities, including local authorities, with access to training and development to deliver more natural flood management.