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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of a Government backed flood reinsurance scheme for businesses that provides specific insurance to businesses within certain categories.

Government conducts recurring research into the affordability and availably of flood insurance. There is no evidence of a systematic problem for businesses at high flood risk not accessing insurance. However, we recognise that access to affordable insurance may be an issue for some businesses and research in 2018 found that 2% of small businesses were not able to find suitable insurance cover for flood risk.

There are a number of business insurance solutions offered by the insurance market, such as insurers who offer increased flood excess with reduced premiums, and parametric insurance which allows property owners to set the level of premium in line with an agreed level of risk. The British Insurers Brokers’ Association (BIBA) also have members who can provide cover for those that are ineligible for Flood Re.

We are working with the insurance industry and the wider commercial sector to help businesses become more resilient to flooding, through the joint Government and industry Property Flood Resilience (PFR) roundtable and through the development of a PFR roadmap by the end of 2022.