Flooding — House of Commons, 2016-01-06
Topic: Public Lands
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): May I begin by paying tribute to the debate, which has been very detailed and serious and has properly reflected the fact that this has been a very unusual and very complex situation? The hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) talked about the unprecedented nature of the rainfall. As has been said repeatedly, every kind of record has been broken, including those for rainfall in 24 and 48 hours and that for rainfall in a month As right hon. and hon. Members across the House have emphasised, it has been the most extraordinary and horrendous experience for people. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) for highlighting the impact on the Traveller community in York Central, who are among thousands of people affected—we now know that more than 12,000 separate homes were affected by this extraordinary experience The emergency services have been astonishing. The hon. Member for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) has paid tribute to the fire and rescue service. We should also pay tribute to the police gold commanders and the sergeants and policemen standing on the streets, in the rain, day in, day out, securing the safety of communities, and to the Army, from the company sergeant-major standing in the streets of Appleby and the 100 men clearing out houses, to the commanding officer of the Light Dragoons working his way up and down the Calder valley. We also note the work of the Environment Agency and people such as Adrian and Phil, who struggled with the problems with electricity to the Foss barrier, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) has said, the actions of councils up and down the country. The council response has been fantastic The hon. Members for Rochdale (Simon Danczuk) and for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) paid tribute to the Muslim communities, which in their different way have contributed, as have the Sikh and Hindu communities. In the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (John Stevenson), I saw church representatives out with hot cross buns at 4.30 in the morning. We also note the sea cadets standing up to their waists in rain water, as well as mountain rescue, the boats and Team Rubicon, which was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams). Moreover, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr Evans) has pointed out, we also note the thousands of anonymous members of the public who got out of their cars and then continued on their journeys I also want to take a small moment to pay tribute to Members of Parliament themselves. On that first evening, I saw the hon. Member for Workington (Sue Hayman) out on the streets of Cockermouth. I saw the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) working with the Methodist Church, and my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle working from dawn to dusk. I also saw the hon. Member for York Central and my hon. Friends the Members for Selby and Ainsty and for Shipley, as well as colleagues in St Michael’s and at Hebden Bridge—and they are just the Members of Parliament I happened to see as I worked my way around the country I also pay tribute to the Flood Forecasting Centre and the work done by the Met Office, which gave us the important warning. That was also central for our colleagues in the devolved Administrations. The floods in 1953-54 killed 450 people, and one of the reasons we have been more fortunate this time is that we have the warning systems in place In the short time available to me, I want to touch on some of the issues raised by right hon. and hon. Members in relation to recovery. Elland bridge was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Craig Whittaker) and the hon. Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch). I reassure them that we are working very hard, particularly on the telecoms challenges in relation to that bridge. My hon. Friend the Member for Selby and Ainsty raised the issue of Tadcaster bridge. I reassure him that we have been able to get Balfour Beatty to work for the next three days. We have located a temporary footbridge, which will be put in place The hon. Member for Copeland (Mr Reed) raised the issue of the A591. For the first time ever, Highways England has agreed to take over, from beginning to end, the project management of a county council road, and it will deliver that in the quickest time possible The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) mentioned the challenges with regard to electricity. My hon. Friends the Members for Carlisle and for Calder Valley raised the challenges for schools. I am pleased that the Secretary of State for Education will be there to deal with those issues herself. My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley mentioned household grants and the hon. Member for Rochdale raised some of the challenges for businesses. I am pleased that the Minister for Small Business, Industry and Enterprise, who is in her place, is addressing that problem directly. The hon. Member for Workington raised the issues in respect of insurance, which we are dealing with along with the Association of British Insurers I want to set all the other issues in context in the very limited time available. Whether, like the many right hon. and hon. Members from Leeds, we are talking about specific defences; fairness in other parts of the country, as was raised by the hon. Members for Dumfries and Galloway (Richard Arkless), for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Stuart Blair Donaldson) and for Fermanagh and South Tyrone (Tom Elliott) and my hon. Friends the Members for Spelthorne (Kwasi Kwarteng), for Newark (Robert Jenrick) and for Newbury (Richard Benyon); the unintended consequences raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy); building on floodplains, which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) and the hon. Member for Workington; the challenges of culverts, which were raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley; the disagreements about dredging, which were evident in the conflict between my hon. Friends the Members for Ribble Valley and for Newbury; farmland, which was raised by the hon. Member for Workington; upstream alleviation, which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury; forestry, which was raised by the hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts); or the overall strategy, which has been pushed hard by the hon. Member for Copeland, we come again and again to the importance of having an independent objective judgment by the Flood Forecasting Centre and the Environment Agency that is respected by this House These decisions cannot be made through party politics. The resources must be allocated on the basis of flood risk, the number of households that will be protected, the position of those households on the deprivation index, the businesses that will be affected, the agriculture that will be affected, and the impacts on productivity, infrastructure and electricity. Those issues of cost and complexity will be central to the debate.