Money for flood protection

20 August 2009

Local communities across England will benefit from £16M funding to help them tackle surface water flooding, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn has announced.

A total of £9.7M has been awarded to 77 local authorities, identified through modelling the effects of very severe rainfall, as having areas where the risk and potential impact of surface water flooding could be highest. Such storms can occur anywhere and are expected to become more frequent in the future with climate change. Local authorities for all other areas will be able to bid for a share of £5M to help them deal with known local flooding problems.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is also spending £1M on making training, data and other tools available to help all local authorities manage flood risk.

Hilary Benn said: 'Local authorities have a crucial role to play in tackling flooding and it’s vital that they have the information, resources and skills they need. That’s why we’ve provided this money and we want to make sure it gets to where it’s most needed and where it can make the biggest difference.'

Defra will publish details of how local authorities can bid for the £5M funding and the criteria on which bids will be assessed, in the next few weeks. Innovative proposals for tackling surface water flooding especially in rural areas, will be particularly welcomed.

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