Report criticises flood defences

A report by the National Audit Office (NAO) says although the Environment Agency has made a number of improvements in the management of flood risk since 2001, it has not met its target to maintain 63% of England's flood defence systems in their target condition.

An all party Commons committee of MPs is calling on the Agency to provide an explanation for the fact that fewer than half of the country's high risk flood defences were at target condition at the time of the NAO's review.

Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee MP Edward Leigh says more effort should go "towards protecting towns and cities, rather than empty fields".

"Flood defences are critical to the protection of towns, cities and people's homes. There are significant variations on the amount spent on defences, with only small change going to the North East compared with the Midlands and Thames.

"Flooding is an ever present risk to millions of homes and businesses in this country but the Environment Agency has not done enough to improve the condition of our flood defences. No less than six years have passed since our Committee asked for remedial action to be carried out as swiftly as possible," Mr Leigh said.

The NAO report, which is independent of the Government, says the Environment Agency has taken on greater oversight of flood risk in England, including the management of important rivers which were previously managed by local authorities and internal drainage boards.

The Agency has protected more people by improving the standard of flood protection for 100,000 households between 2003-04 and 2005-06, improved its management of flood defence construction projects and developed a more rigorous system for classifying, recording and monitoring the condition of flood defence assets. But the NAO report points out that since 2001 the general conditions of assets have not improved significantly, with 50% of linear defences and 61% of flood defence structures in good condition or better in 2007, compared to 64% and 57% respectively at the time of the previous report.

The NAO recommends that the Agency should focus more consistently on flood defences which are medium or high risk to bring them up to target condition and follow up earlier inspections to confirm that key remedial works to flood defences have been completed satisfactorily and address weaknesses in data systems.

Sir John Bourn, Comptroller and Auditor General of the NAO said: "The Agency has made progress in improving how it manages England's flood defences since I last reported in 2001. But climate change is likely to increase the number of homes and businesses at risk of flooding in the future. If the Environment Agency has any chance of meeting its future targets it must now focus more consistently on improving the condition of its high risk flood defences. "