15/01/2015 - Permalink

Regional Flood and Coastal Committee members continue to support flood alleviation work across Shropshire

Related topics: Community / Partner organisations

News from our partners Environment Agency

Over £20 million of public investment has been pledged to reduce flood risk across the English Severn and Wye catchment over the next six years.

On Tuesday 13 January 2015 members of the Environment Agency’s English Severn and Wye Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (RFCC) pledged approximately £6 million over the next six years towards flood alleviation works across the catchment.

The Local Levy funds pledged by the RFCC members will support national Grant in Aid funds that were announced by the Government in December 2014.  This local investment has helped provisionally secure a further £15 million of national funding over the next six years.

This will allow schemes to progress across Shropshire, including:

  • A £1.2 million flood alleviation scheme in Much Wenlock which will involve creating flood storage to reduce the risk of flooding to 142 properties
  • Individual property level protection schemes to help reduce flood risk to over 55 properties across Shropshire
  • A scheme involving natural solutions to slow down the amount of flow entering the rivers through land management techniques and through the planting of woodlands.

The Environment Agency and Shropshire Council will be commencing work in a number of other areas across the county to progress new schemes.

In each of the last two years, approximately £110,000 has been contributed by Shropshire as a county, with a similar amount of Local Levy funding being contributed in previous years.  This ongoing investment has helped deliver £7.1 million of flood defence schemes, including Frankwell and Coleham in Shrewsbury and around the Shropshire and Wales border along the River Severn.  These schemes benefit properties and protect key roads at Welsh and English Bridge.  Shropshire Council have used £300,000 of this investment to deliver flood defence schemes which protect 77 properties.

Councillor Malcolm Price, RFCC member for Shropshire Council, said:

“The schemes included on the indicative programme will bring real benefit to a large number of homes at risk of flooding across Shropshire.  This is great news.  We must now continue to work hard to deliver these schemes and identify new ones that may be able to attract further Local Levy and Government funding in the future.”

Anthony Perry, Area Flood Risk Manager, said:

“We are really pleased that this funding has been made available for capital projects and to assist communities with property protection schemes.  This money will go a long way in making communities more resilient, and protecting them from the effects of flooding which we know can be devastating.”

Further information

More information about the Severn and Wye Regional Flood and Coastal Committee can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/english-severn-and-wye-regional-flood-and-coastal-committee

Local Levy funding

Councils raise Local Levy to fund works in partnership with others and local priority projects that do not qualify for central government funding.

Grant in Aid funding

In December, central government (Defra) announced a six-year programme of funding known as capital Flood Defence Grant-in-Aid (FDGiA). This is also used to fund flood and coastal erosion risk management projects.

The investment programme was published by the Environment Agency: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/programme-of-flood-and-coastal-erosion-risk-management-schemes.