The government has defended its funding of flood defences after it emerged ministers were told spending cuts could leave 240,000 extra households facing a “significant risk” of flood damage within 20 years.
A document presented to ministers in November last year – just days before Cumbria was inundated – warned of the risks posed by extreme weather events becoming more frequent.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said the document was outdated because the flood defence budget had been increased in the autumn statement.
Details of the paper drawn up by the Association of Drainage Authorities (ADA) were reported in the Observer as more heavy rain hit the UK and David Cameron announced a £40m package to bolster defences in areas hit by Storm Eva.
The ADA, which represents a range of organisations responsible for managing water levels, says in the document: “We have had the five wettest years since 2000. The Environment Agency’s funding for maintaining flood assets has fallen by 14%. Downward adjustments have also been made to intended revenue spending commitments.”
It warns that “failure of assets and networks is more likely as extreme weather events become more frequent and unpredictable” and recommends a change in approach to a more long-term strategy.
Referring to the potential impact of spending cuts, the document says: “Annual flood and storm damage costs are approximately £1.1bn, according to the Association of British Insurers, and those households at significant risk [of flood damage] through a reduction in our capacity to manage water levels could increase from 330,000 today to 570,000 in 2035.”
The document says cuts to local authority budgets left councils with little option but to reduce funding to drainage boards and other organisations and landowners who manage river levels.
“Such reductions in investment mean that some river, watercourse and sea defence systems and structures are maintained only to a minimal level; consequently the useful lives of those assets will be reduced,” the document says.
“The rivers and coasts of some rural areas are at a major crossroads and their funding is purely based on the benefits of flood risk to people and property as calculated currently. The Environment Agency has ... reduced the extent of their watercourse channel maintenance and taken steps to stop operating a number of structures and systems. Examples include lowland catchments across Lancashire and Cumbria.”
The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) currently has 23 flood warnings in place, mostly for Tayside, after the Met Office issued an amber “be prepared” alert until 3pm on Monday for rainfall in north-east and central Scotland, where the ground is already saturated, putting it at risk of further flooding.
Overnight, Braemar and Crathie in Aberdeenshire, which saw some of the worst of the storm damage earlier in the week, lost telephone and 999 service as BT struggled to repair a cable damaged during Storm Frank. BT and the Red Cross are providing temporary cover through communication vehicles.
Access and repairs have been made more difficult after a significant section of the A93 Ballater to Braemar road collapsed into the river Dee on Wednesday.
Vincent Fitzsimons from Sepa said: “Unfortunately we are expecting flooding in north-eastern areas of Scotland. That’s property flooding and damage to infrastructure and utilities.
“The rivers in the north-east are just beginning to respond but it’s important to emphasise we are not expecting flooding until later on Saturday, from Saturday afternoon, and most rivers are not predicted to peak in that area until Sunday.”
Police are advising people to stay away from already flooded areas, and to avoid driving through flood waters, where there may be unforeseen dangers such as lifted manhole covers.
After two people died on swollen rivers in Scotland, police have also warned people planning to go out on rivers that water levels remain high in some areas and that debris from the recent flooding is still in the water.
Responding to the document that detailed flood defence spending, A Defra spokeswoman said: “These claims are simply not true. This document was written before last autumn’s spending review, in which we increased flood defence spending to £2.3bn by 2021.
“And we’re spending more on flood defences in this parliament than in the last, by building 1,500 new flood defence schemes that will better protect 300,000 more homes, which itself is more than was spent in the parliament before that.
“No other government has ever made such a long-term commitment to fight floods and help protect our most at-risk communities and we can only afford to increase flood defence spending because we’re building a stronger economy.”
Cameron announced that £40m would be spent on fixing and bolstering flood defences battered by Storm Eva.
Charities raising cash for communities left devastated over Christmas by the deluge will be matched by the government up to a total of £2m in a move echoing pledges to earlier flooding victims.
Thousands of homes and businesses across large areas of northern England were hit by severe flooding as the storm wreaked havoc on Boxing Day.
Cameron said: “I have seen at first hand the devastation caused by flooding. And that’s why this work to repair and improve flood defences is so vital.”
Around £10m of the funding package will be used to improve defences in York after they failed to cope during the storm. Environment Agency officials decided to lift the Foss barrier designed to protect the city after finding its pumps were at risk of electrical failure due to water entering the building, prompting widespread anger among residents.
The rest of the cash will be spent on repairing defences on the Calder, Aire, Ouse and Derwent rivers in Yorkshire as well as the Wharfe, which runs through Tadcaster, a town that was split in two when a historic bridge collapsed.
Cameron has made transport minister Robert Goodwill a “flooding envoy” for Yorkshire to oversee the response in the region and identify what must be done to protect the area in the future.