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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to her Department's press release entitled Multi-billion pound investment as government unveils new long-term plan to tackle flooding, published on 14 July 2020, how much of the up to £170 million she planned to spend to accelerate work on shovel-ready flood defence schemes that would begin construction in 2020 or 2021 (a) has been spent and (b) remains to be spend as of November 2023.

The £170m investment for work on shovel-ready schemes was commenced in 2021, as part of a package of investment measures by Government to boost the economic recovery following the covid pandemic. All 23 projects that form part of this scheme are underway and funding is being invested into these. Between 1 April 2020 and 31 March 2022 the Government invested £87m into these schemes. The data from 1 April 2022 has not been classified to the sufficient level of detail to provide a response in the time frame of a Parliamentary Question. Please write to the Environment Agency directly if you still require this information.

Further details on the current investment programme and projects completed can also be found in the Flood and coastal erosion risk management report: 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).