Waveney MP Peter Aldous has warned that Suffolk and Norfolk flood defences dating back to the Eden and Macmillan governments are in need of urgent repair, upgrade and replacement with flooding along the coast set to get worse in the coming years.

 

In a House of Commons debate yesterday, Aldous called for a change in the approach to flood risk management reflecting on the floods in 2007 and 2013, and saying that he feared the East Anglian coast would not be “third time lucky” and that it is important that new defences are put in place as soon as practically possible.

 

Mr Aldous pointed out that:  “The picture of the impact of the flood particularly on infrastructure and sea defences is still not complete and it is a race against time to get open the beaches the tourism season. We need to learn lessons from the night of 5 December and consider how we can best manage flood risk, making the best possible use of the available resources, which will be limited.”

 

He went on to add that flood defence management has been fragmented since the 1994 the National Rivers Authority was scrapped and called for one department to take overall control to ensure greater co-ordination and simplification. “Locally, a whole-river approach to flood management should be adopted, from source to the sea. Each catchment and each river is different, and each should be managed by local people, who invariably know best,” he argued.

 

Mr Aldous has been campaigning for improved flood defence management since the storm surge hit Lowestoft last December greatly impacting on households and businesses and has pledged to continue to do so to ensure that local communities have the necessary resources to tackle the increase in floods predicted from climate change.