Floods and blame shifting

POGS looking to the future, if we have more winters like this, there will have to be tough decisions made. There are brutal cuts in public expenditure still to come. 9% to come off the NHS. If Cameron is going to suddenly restore the cut budget of the EA and give them lots more money to restore and improve flood defences then a great deal of money is going to have to be found. So would you like even bigger cuts in the NHS, and other public services? Or would you like to pay a dollop more tax? Or maybe freeze pensions? Because those are really the sort of choices that will have to be made if you don't want to let nature take its course.

DH said that no-one ever resigns for failing to do their job properly these days, if they are removed they move on the merry-go-round to another lucrative position to mess that up/go to the House of Lords/do both.

I should clarify my statement this is a manmade problem.

There would be flooding on the Levels/Moors given the weather conditions. However they would most definitely not be the dire flooding levels we are seeing now.

Jess M

This is not a cost saving matter. It has taken years of neglect by the Environmental Agency to create this 'MANMADE' problem', along with that other bankrupt institution the EU.

Yes I do agree that is a good principle. Criticise what they do or don't do. Not a very nasty comment though

I haven't said that this isn't a political issue. What I have said is that I can't see that making personal comments about the powers that be is at all helpful or relevant. We are where we are and of course some very serious decisions are going to have to be made, and I hope that somehow some solution can be arrived at for everyone affected by this appalling event. In other words that ALL people of good will can put their heads together regardless of political affiliations (and personal appearance.) Probably a forlorn hope, but still worth hoping for.

The fact is for years the Levels/Moors have not been dredged. This includes the rivers and equally important the rhynes as we call them, ditches in other words.

This has gone on with successive governments in charge, both Labour and Coalition. The biggest culprit IS the Environmental Agency. It has run roughshod over the wishes/knowledge of the local inhabitants, who have been warning for years what the lack of dredging could cause.

I wouldn't mind betting Lord Smith will have an extremely difficult time there today. The Environmental Agency HAS put wildlife before the farming, business needs and safety of the population. It has now been proven the locals were right all along. How the hell will it recover from this 'manmade' disaster, words fail me.

This is not just a few people moving out. These are people who 'might' have lost their home, their livelyhood and communities demolished. It is heartbreaking and for farmers it is a lifetime of work gone up in smoke.

I am heartbroken for tthem.

If the Dutch people had the same level of incompetence of the English Environmental Agency the whole of Holland would be under water.!

Here is an animation that shows what is happening in the Arctic. Very dramatic change in September ice cover over the last 20 years. This ice is floating so it will not affect sea levels. But it is affecting the oceans and the oceans drive our weather patterns.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHxHxI4VuAM

nigglynellie you can't get away from the fact that this is a political issue and is likely to become more so if extreme weather like this continues. The last 3 years have had "unusual" weather in the winter - the last 3 it was ice and snow in parts of the country that usually get very little. This year it is something different. The sea ice in the Arctic is melting fast and this seems to be contributing to the way the gulf stream and the jet stream work. It is happening faster than scientists can study it.
Politics comes into it, however sympathetic we feel towards flood victims. With 9% due to be cut off the NHS budget it is obvious that the country is going to have to make some tough decisions.
I am unconvinced though that either Cameron or Pickles are going to do much to help either current or future flood victims. They have just cut the budget for the environment agency. 15% of their flooding staff are being made redundant this year.

http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/analysis/2320948/owen-paterson-defends-environment-agency-budget-cuts-as-floods-hit-uk-again
http://news.sky.com/story/1205873/environment-agency-boss-regrets-flood-response

In 2008 Morpeth flooded quite badly. They had the money and the plans for the flood defences by 2010. This government then cut the money back, so they could not do the full defence system.
It flooded again and now the system is going to cost another £3m.
Short sighted or what? In the meantime lots of people have been flooded out again and again.

Margaret74, my village in Durham has been on the national news because of the flooding. It's on the main road between Durham and Consett, and when the road floods through the village the main road floods and cuts us off from everywhere. The main road is in a valley and the houses are built on hills, so it's all the shops and schools and library and doctor's surgery that get flooded when it rains. It rained yesterday, so I do not know if I will be able to get to the chemist yet to get my prescription today.
£1.2m will pay for a new outfall to take floodwater from a culvert into a burn, allowing gullies to empty quicker. This is going to take 2 years.
There are sandbags permanently in front of the village shops, and pumps stored by the three churches. This village is larger than some of the ones in Somerset, and we were cut off last year. So why should we not get money to make our lives easier?

I'm not sure that personal comments about certain politician's and rather fatuous remarks regarding what is such a serious and dreadful situation that so many people are having to face are particularly helpful. It is so easy to blame this person and that person for whatever, but we are where we are and hopefully somebody can, whatever their political persuasion, social class(!) (or large girth) come up with a do able sensible, affordable plan of action to mitigate this situation from happening again. I can remember as a very small child sitting on the river wall at our home in Berkshire, watching the dredger going down, doing what dredgers do. The river never did come over that wall, but whether that was due to dredging or good fortune I can't say.

The Dutch have a country that has an impressive amount of land that is several metres below the level of the north sea. Quite a project. However they don't have uplands draining extra water down onto these low areas.
There was indeed a great bit about Welsh Water reducing flooding that was covered by the BBC yesterday. Also a hydrologist talking about letting trees fall into upland streams etc. All well and good but if you have a large area of land that is below sea level, some significant hills and lots of rain well, what can be done? You can't suddenly re-forest the hills with established woodland.
The extra factor that we cannot exactly calculate is the effects of global warming (which is happening, whatever you think is causing it) and it will result (may well be resulting) in more unpredictable and possibly extreme weather patterns. And it will result in rising sea levels. So sooner or later there are going to be a lot of much tougher decisions to make about our coasts and low lying areas.

Now all we need is an invitation to sit on COBRA!

Trees soak up a lot of the water directly, and their roots hold the soil together so that it does not wash away to silt up the slower-flowing parts of the water system.

Re those beavers - when they cut down a tree it is from a couple of feet up the trunk, essentially coppicing it. New shoots grow from the base and the roots are still holding the soil together. The dams hold back water in the smaller streams preferred by the fussy creatures, so it does not shoot rapidly down to flood the lower flatter areas downstream.

That is what happened in Bangladesh.

Although i wasn't posting specifically about the Somerset Levels in particular but about reducing the incident of flooding in general through more natural methods, I've looked up that area and found this.
'The Somerset Levels are bisected by the Polden Hills; the areas to the south are drained by the River Parrett, and the areas to the North by the rivers Axe and Brue. The Mendip Hills separate the Somerset Levels from the North Somerset Levels.'
While I agree this would not be a complete solution, because of the low lying nature of this area and it's potential for inundation from the sea and probable aquifers too, it might form part of a tranch of measures as there are rivers draining onto this land laden with excess water from increase rainfall.
I don't think I mentions tree planting but it is known that deforestation allows soil to be washed into rivers which increases the rate of silting up.

Bring back the Dutch, they drained them in the first place and seem to know what they are doing

You do, do you Jess?

oh the mendips and the quantocks by the look. Well start by covering them with mature trees then.

I think the Somerset levels would be flooded by now, however the uplands are managed (not sure what uplands might be draining down there but one of you locals maybe knows). It was a swamp for thousands of years wasn't it?

Missed the OP in my ramble. Was the EA directed by the government to re-direct the funds or did they make their own decisions? Watch to see who can wriggle most.

The EA have used more money to create wildlife habitats (not saying this is wrong if there is a bottomless pit) than on flood defences or drainage. If we say this area should be abandoned then there will be a gap to fill in food production as well as the distressing loss of homes and communities. As I said in another post why should thjs concern Chris Smith of rural Islington and the upper echelons of the EA? Food comes from the supermarket doesn't it?

Not sure how much above sea level the M5 is, but it wouldn't be long before it was washed away, what with the rail link to the SW being in peril, it wouldn't be long before the south west was abandoned to kts fate.

They have to find the money and urgently.

Duramjen - you sajd your village has been gjven £1.2 million for flood defences - do you think it is better to gjve the mkney jn small amounts locally like this or fkr a 'joined-up' approach?
Excuse typos.

Aka huge now I really must get on!