Flooding in Cumbria – no magic bullet solutions but a long term action plan is needed.

As a Cumbrian living outside the county I feel helpless. Should I rush up to Cumbria to help or keep away as resources such as dry beds, electric power and fresh clean water are stressed. I watch from afar feeling the emotion and shock from my dry home in Derbyshire.

I have no immediate skills to offer but I’m contributing to the emergency funding and am trying to encourage others to do the same.

I have read the usual comments from farmers, that we don’t dredge the rivers anymore implying that speeding up the water flow is an answer. I have read a post calling for beavers to be reintroduced to slow the flow of water down rivers implying that floodplains should be allowed to do their job. They are all wrong.

I have read a great deal about flooding and land management since the Somerset Levels flooded. The stupidity of the Somerset politicians astounded me. But no one was brave enough to point a TV camera at them and ask obvious questions. 

To the politician:

In the last year, how many meeting have you been to with any of the 30 Parrett Catchment Project (PCP) partnership organisations? The main bodies are the Somerset Drainage Boards Consortium, Somerset County Council , National Farmers’ Union, Sedgemoor District Council, Environment Agency, South Somerset District Council, Taunton Deane Borough Council, Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG). 

In effect: Before you criticise the Environment Agency, what have you done? 

To the farmer:

When you say you want the river dredged, what exactly is it in the river? Your topsoil? Can I see your soil management plan? (by law every farmer has one, although the coalition government reduced this bit of red tape so now no-one has the power to see it).

It would probably have been career suicide for the reporter to be that insensitive.

The very best ideas and articles have come from local people with local knowledge, and guess what, in other parts of the country this works.

I know that the rainfall was unprecedented but the flood defences for towns can never be a complete solution. The best approach I’ve come across is from Wales.

The Pontbren Project. A farmer-led approach to sustainable land management in the uplands.

http://www.coedcymru.org.uk/farmwoodlands.html click on News and the Pontbren Project.

Or

http://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/publications/2013/02/the-pontbren-project/

The Pontbren results have shown conclusively that strategically planted narrow, fenced shelter belts of trees across slopes capture surface run-off from the pasture land above and allow it to soak more rapidly into the soil. Prepare to be shocked – up to 60 times more water can be soaked into woods than pastureland. That is not a misprint – 60 times more.

In Somerset they had a campaign for this called The Big Sponge. Okay Somerset problems are different to Cumbria, for a start the Levels are close to below sea level. Thanks to climate change the sea level on the Somerset coast is 5 to 7 inches higher than it was 100 years ago. 

Sadly the expertise that was being built up has been set back by this government and its previous coalition. The Labour government set up partnerships between the Environment Agency and local bodies including private business interests funded by taxpayer grants. These grants have been removed. The Environment Agency have done their best but have faced staff reductions and budget reductions as high as any in the public services. Flood defence spending has only risen if you add in one off emergency grants following flooding incidents. More planned expenditure has been cut considerably.

I don’t want to be overly political here, that would be cheap, but Cumbria has to develop a “Big Sponge” plan. The flood defences will cope but only if we slow down the water flow rate. Government through the EA, local councils (catchment projects), and local business (such as the Universities and farmers) have to work together. Incidentally the biggest funding for the Parrett Catchment Project is the European Union Regional Development Fund. 

Okay, I know that Cumbria has a lot of trees but I would ask, where are the trees on the side of Blencathra, on Threlkeld Common. I know that Cumbria’s topography is different with those funnel shaped valleys. It’s just that dredging is such a stupid idea.  Almost as bad as making EA engineers and scientists redundant.