The government’s Environment Agency should serve the public
Almost the same amount of rain that flooded the Somerset levels fell in the Netherlands, but there were no floods in the Netherlands . . .
Following flooding in 2012 and 2013, on 24th January this year, in light of the flooding of the Somerset Moors, Somerset County Council and Sedgemoor District Council declared a major incident.
Environment Minister Owen Paterson visited the area on 27 January 2014, and promised at a media-only press conference that if a local water management plan could be developed over the next six weeks, he would approve it. This would probably include the dredging of both the rivers Tone and Parrett, and possibly a later sluice near Bridgwater.
Fortunately the prime minister took a different line and called for immediate action.
On 22nd January Hansard recorded an address by the local MP, Ian Liddell Grainger in which he described the Environment Agency as one of the most expensive quangos in this country:
”It employs more people than the Canadian environment agency, and the number of people employed by the environment agencies of Denmark, France, Germany, Sweden and Austria put together . . . (Ed: but note that it has decided to sack staff employed working on flood risk management) . . .
“Today on the levels (it) spends far more money creating floods than averting them. Right now the agency is pioneering a . . . scheme to flood the Steart peninsula near the Hinkley Point nuclear power station, which we in Somerset know about, in order to create a “wonderful” habitat for wildlife. The agency will also prove to . . . Brussels that we are doing all we can to meet EU objectives to make life more comfortable for reed warblers”.
Passing through environmental charities’ revolving doors to the House of Lords
The current chief executive of the Environment Agency is continuing the policies of his predecessor, Barbara Young, once chairman of English Nature and chief executive of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, who has been elevated to the House of Lords as Baroness Young of Old Scone.
The Environment Agency, created eighteen years ago, made a policy U-turn
Regular dredging of the Parrett and the Tone came to an end and the agency decided that the future lay in managing any floods that might result. The Parrett and the Tone rivers are now so silted up that in some places they no longer act as rivers at all. Before the creation of the agency the main rivers were regularly dredged by the old river boards, because rivers on low-lying land silt up if they are not dredged. One of the benefits of regular dredging is that the riverbanks are built up at the same time.
Dutch assistance needed
Mr Liddell-Grainger continued: “In Holland they dredge, they prepare and they protect. They plan for the worst and rarely suffer a problem.
“There is a wonderful machine used in East Anglia which has been brilliant, and I am going to go to see it in action—I am arranging to see Dutch engineers to support the task, and I will speak to my Somerset colleagues about it. The task is not difficult or impossible . . .
“I am meeting members of the Dutch Parliament in Strasbourg next week at the Council of Europe to talk about what they can do to help us to get the Environment Agency to change its mind.
Tessa Munt, MP for Wells, said that if the money paid by internal drainage boards to the Environment Agency is given back to the internal drainage boards (IDBs) along with some responsibility, then contractors with expertise and knowledge of the local area can actually carry out work to prevent flooding in future.
If only it were so simple; but there is a hidden quango-led agenda, not unrelated to the tourist lobby and the rewilding policies of environmental quangos and charities which work to reintroduce predator birds and animals.
Posted on January 31, 2014, in Conflict of interest, Corporate political nexus, Lobbying, MPs, Revolving door, Vested interests and tagged Baroness Barbara Young, Council of Europe, Dutch engineers, Dutch Parliament, East Anglia, Environment Agency, Environmental quangos, Internal drainage boards, MP Ian Liddell Grainger, MP Tessa Munt, Predators, Rewilding, Somerset Moors. Bookmark the permalink. 5 Comments.
Political Concern 
Not sure what your main point is here. Are you saying the recent flooding of the Somerset levels was exacerbated/caused by an Environmental Agency policy of deliberately allowing them to flood (i.e. by suspending dredging) specifically to create wildlife habitats?
No.
But it is on record that the EA has reduced dredging and wants to create a series of linked wetlands in that – and other – areas, using some fertile land for the purpose.
Personally, I think the media gets a bit mixed up on this issue. Dredging can exacerbate flooding in downstream areas as the rainwater is drained faster and is fired downstream with increased speed & capacity. From what I understand, the Somerset Levels are a different case in that they are man-made drainage channels (at least that’s how they started) and as such require regular dredging. Long term solutions must entail looking at ways to slow & hold rainwater upstream – we have uplands denuded of trees to make space for financially unsustainable sheep farms (surviving on subsidies) and ex-floodplains containing straightened waterways & building developments. Putting back trees, meanders & floodplains must help – but in their absence, in this case, I think even dredged rivers would not have prevented the widespread flooding disaster.
Agreed except for the hill farming reference. See the case put by a Cumbrian sheep farmer: http://fairdealfooduk.wordpress.com/3-articles/hill-farming-hilary-wilson/
Of course farming is crucial & many families depend on it, but many upland farms (especially up here in Scotland) are owned by very rich landowners & ‘investors’, with a business strategy to suck up as many taxpayer subsidies as possible. For land to qualify for pillar 1 subsidies land HAS to be cleared whether it’s used to produce food or not. I’d suggest that CAP reform is crucial here, especially as it openly encourages ‘consolidation’ of farms. No-one wants to see the small/medium farmer lose their livelihoods & heritage, but the system is geared towards encouraging widespread environmental destruction, with consequences such as downstream flooding.
I strongly disagree that ALL farmers strive to maintain biodiversity, many of them are striving just to keep their businesses going (I could go into reasons such as supermarket price blackmail, the amount of food we waste & our over-consumption of meat). Habitat loss is one of the main reasons that we are losing native species at a rapid rate, and modern farming practices have contributed to that. Sheep (& deer up here) are responsible to a large extent for an upland monoculture that supports a tiny fraction of life that it would be capable of with more land excluded from their jaws.
The reference you mention goes on about environmental lobbies, but we’ve seen recently that the NFU (mainly representing mega landowners/investors) get pretty-much everything they ask for of our glorious environment minister.
Maybe we can agree to disagree on this one 😉