15:00 Stephanie Peacock (Labour)

Without a fully integrated approach to flood defence management, reinforced by major investment and support from the Government, the homes and livelihoods of the people of South Yorkshire are at risk. A long-term catchment-wide approach will be crucial in the coming years. That will include natural flood management measures across catchment areas to slow water discharge, from trees and habitat flooding to peat bog renewal. The Mayor of Sheffield City Region and the four South Yorkshire local authorities are working in conjunction with the Environment Agency to produce a consolidated South Yorkshire-wide investment programme in our flood defences. The programme is likely to cost in excess of £200 million. We need sustained funding in flood defence infrastructure to improve the resilience of regions such as ours to climate change and escalating flooding risk.

We cannot escape the fact that climate change is directly linked to severe flood events happening more often and more severely. More needs to be done to tackle climate change and its impact. People from my area feel let down by the Government’s reaction to the crisis. It is time the Government took flood risk more seriously.

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15:11 Ed Miliband (Labour)

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies, particularly as your mother resides in my constituency, so this debate has particular relevance to your family. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) on securing this important debate, and it is good to see the Minister in her place. I know she takes the issues around climate change and the climate emergency very seriously and is a sympathetic listener, as I hope she will be today.

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15:22 Ruth Jones (Labour)

There may not have been many speakers in this debate, but I am sure you will agree, Mr Davies, that the calibre of the debate has been extremely high. We heard clearly and eloquently from my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) about the impact in her constituency and across South Yorkshire of the floods that took place three months ago. Most of us in this place spent November 2019 knocking on doors in the coldest, most miserable general election in recent memory. However, my hon. Friend and her constituency neighbours knew it as a time of heartache, pain and loss for many in that part of the world. My right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), whose knowledge and expertise in the area of environment and climate change is unparalleled, made a wide-ranging and comprehensive contribution to today’s debate. I trust that the Minister will take on board his points of concern.

The biggest obstacle to providing a proper flood strategy for South Yorkshire and the UK more generally is the fact that the Government just do not seem to take flooding and its consequences seriously. To restore trust for the people of South Yorkshire a joined-up approach is required, across regional water authorities, local government and regulators, to provide a single flood plan for an area to manage flood risk and better co-ordinate the response to flooding. There is a climate emergency in this country and across our planet. We see it every day and we hear from our constituents about it every day. Our planet is getting warmer and the chance and frequency of extreme and deadly weather events and patterns increases day by day. Her Majesty’s Opposition will continue to make the case for Britain to be more prepared, as we can be through habitat restoration and by returning floodplain to a more natural state. That would help to prevent the risk of flooding and allow floodplain to absorb more water. That point was made by the hon. Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) earlier in the debate.

I agree. The hon. Gentleman’s knowledge of the local area is obviously much more detailed than mine, but I am happy to work with anybody to ensure that the floodplains do their job and absorb water more clearly and effectively. The Government cannot necessarily change or stop the global impact of climate change, but actions can be taken here by the Minister and in this Parliament to mitigate the impact of flooding on the people who live in South Yorkshire, and others across the United Kingdom.

There is an important point to be made about resources. After the floods of 2015 the then Prime Minister, David Cameron, said the immortal words, “Money is no object”. If only the actions of his and the current Government matched those words. Austerity has had a devastating impact on our environment. There have been unprecedented cuts to the budgets of local authorities across the country, including South Yorkshire. There have also been cuts to organisations such as Natural England and the Environment Agency. Staffing levels at the Environment Agency have fallen by around 20% since the Tories came to power in 2010. Natural England has had its budget slashed by more than half, from £242 million in the last year of the Labour Government to just £100 million in 2017-18, resulting in the loss of more than 1,000 jobs. All of that has seriously undermined the ability of the United Kingdom to tackle the environmental crisis facing our country and to deal with the impact of climate change more generally. I say to the Minister that we have no time to waste, because flooding is not going to go away, so we need a comprehensive plan for every community at risk of flooding.

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15:29 The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Rebecca Pow)

In the meantime, the Government are of course looking at funding arrangements and needs beyond 2021, when this funding window ends. We will continue to work with the Environment Agency and others to consider future investment needs and the role of Government in supporting resilient communities. In addition to what I call conventional flood defence mechanisms, a wide range of other mechanisms are being used, and will increasingly be used, to reduce flooding, using a catchment approach, and particularly nature-based approaches. The right hon. Member for Doncaster North is vociferous on climate change—absolutely rightly; we have done much work together on that front. This is all interlinked with that agenda and will help towards the whole climate change issue.

On funding, we recognise where deprivation is highest through higher payments when flood money is handed out. That is obviously important in urban and rural areas. Obviously, climate change, which will give us more extreme weather events and impacts on the environment, is a crucial national priority, and also a really important international priority. The UK is already demonstrating that we are leading the fight on this, and we are delivering our world-leading target for net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. However, adapting to the inevitable changes brought about by climate change is vital. We are taking robust action to improve the resilience of our people, our economy and our environment through investment, not least through the commitment of £2.6 billion over six years to better protect communities from flooding and erosion.

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