As Crawley’s flood risk grows, only Labour is committed to action

Every year at the start of January there are parts of Crawley which flood with such regularity that you could almost mark it in your calendar.

For the most part this is simply an annoyance which abates in a day or so, not the kind of event which attracts headlines, but despite being at a reasonably high altitude compared to much of the urban parts of the county, that doesn’t mean that Crawley isn’t at risk. The town was one of the hardest hit parts of the UK during the Great Flood of 1968 and was, more recently, badly affected by flooding in 2000.

The reality is that the town is enveloped by tributaries for the River Mole and consequently with sufficient rainfall, even this far from the coast or a major river, we are vulnerable.

Such rainfall has historically been a roughly one in a hundred year event, but this risk has been growing significantly. While climate change will have different effects in different locations, for the UK the end result isn’t Mediterranean weather, it’s increasingly rainy and stormy weather as the hot air carries greater amounts of rain further in-land.

With the risk of major flooding events growing, we need a Government that’s prepared to act, which is why it is welcome that the Labour Party is planning to foster greater responsiveness through the establishment of a Flood Resilience Taskforce, meeting every winter ahead of the peak flooding season. 

The COBRA-style taskforce will coordinate flooding preparation and resilience between central government, local authorities, local communities, and emergency services. It will ensure that vulnerable areas are identified and protected with flooding alleviation measures and provide accountability for progress on flood prevention in areas at risk before floods take place.

The Government’s failure to act against the risk of floods has cost the economy nearly £4 billion pound since 2010, new analysis from Labour has found. Four major floods have hit Britain since 2010 costing £3.8 billion pounds with thousands of homes destroyed, businesses decimated, and agriculture dilapidated. 

Years of Conservative complacency have left communities up and down the country unnecessarily exposed to flood damage. The Government slashed the resources of the Environment Agency – the agency tasked with flood preparedness and response – by two-thirds since 2010, leaving families and businesses to pay the price for extreme floods. 

One in six UK properties are now at risk of flooding and that is likely to shift to one in three due to climate change.

The next Labour Government will also appoint a Minister for Resilience within the Cabinet Office and overhaul local resilience forums–the performance of which was frankly woeful in our area during the pandemic–so that they are more ready to respond to emergencies such as floods.

Rather than following Labour’s lead the Government has ignored the problem, leaving communities all over the UK exposed to the dangers of flooding. Communities who are preparing for a difficult winter around the UK should be given confidence that if the worst comes to worst, there is a plan in place to coordinate responses and keep people, their homes, and their businesses safe.