Flood Control: Finance

(asked on 21st February 2024) - 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 he will publish a breakdown of spending from the flood and coastal erosion risk management investment programme by the (a) number, (b) type and (c) location of flood defences completed.


Answered by
Robbie Moore Portrait
Robbie Moore
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This question was answered on 21st March 2024

Each year the Environment Agency produces a summary of flood and coastal erosion risk management work carried out by risk management authorities in England. This is required under Section 18 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010. When the current FCERM investment programme ends, after March 2027, the Environment Agency will publish a report with a breakdown of spending, similar to the report published in 2022 after the 2015-2021 investment programme.

We are in the third year of the current 6-year £5.2 billion Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management (FCERM) investment programme. At the end of March 2023, the Environment Agency estimated that approximately £1.5 billion of this funding has been invested with over 200 flood risk schemes completed and almost 60,000 properties better protected. Below is a breakdown of spending by region for the current investment programme.

ONS Region

2021 to 2023 expenditure (£ millions)

2021 to 2023 Properties better protected

East Midlands

148

9,620

East of England

153

5,730

London

67

9,730

North East

29

240

North West

203

6,570

South East

246

17,490

South West

191

4,240

West Midlands

72

2,790

Yorkshire & Humber

244

2,940

Nationally led projects

144

0

Total

1,496

59,350

The breakdown of the types of schemes delivered within the first two years is as follows:

Main Rivers/Sea

140

Coastal Erosion

8

Surface Water

66

Reticulating Splines