Lord Lieutenant tells Shropshire’s flood-hit communities, “we care”

The Lord Lieutenant on her visit to Longden Coleham

“We haven’t forgotten you – we care”. That’s the message from the Lord Lieutenant of Shropshire who visited Longden Coleham in Shrewsbury last Friday (21 February 2020) to learn about the impact of last week’s flooding, and to talk to many of those affected by it.

Anna Turner JP visited Coleham in the aftermath of last week’s floods when the recovery operation was underway – but before Coleham was again closed due to flooding over the weekend.

She joined Shropshire Council officers, and visited six local businesses, to show her support and to learn about scale and impact of the flooding – and the work being carried out to help business, residents and the local community to recover.

Watch the Lord Lieutenant speaking in this short video:

She said:

“I know it’s impossible to understand what it’s like to be flooded – so I wanted to come down and have a look and talk to everyone. And I want everyone to understand that we do really, deeply, care and we’re very sorry for what has happened.

“I know that the council has been working 24/7 – they’re getting pretty tired and have had sleepless nights worrying about things, but they care about the safety and keeping people out of danger.

“And the community has been absolutely brilliant. They have thrown their hearts in, helping the emergency services with tea and coffee, providing accommodation. Thank you to everyone who has done that.”

The Lord Lieutenant is the Queen’s representative in Shropshire. She said she will be writing to the Queen to keep her informed about how people are coping in Shropshire.

Mark Barrow, Shropshire Council’s executive director of place, said:

“We’re supporting those that need immediate help straight away and we’ve had hundreds of people out across the county in the past days. We’ve responded really well and really positively. We’re going flat out, helping people as best we can.

“We’ve done a lot of door-knocking and made a lot of phone calls in the past few days, checking on people and businesses affected by flooding and making them aware of the help and emergency funding available to them. We’ll continue to do so.”

Clive Wright, chief executive of Shropshire Council, said:

“There’s a 200 strong workforce at the frontline, but back at Shirehall there’s a team working all day with our key partners – including the Environment Agency, police and fire service, to organise and co-ordinate how we deploy our resources to ensure that we help our local communities as best we can, and minimise the impact of the flooding.”

For more information about help and support available to those affected by flooding, call 0345 678 9006 or visit www.shropshire.gov.uk.

Further information

Financial support is available from the Government for eligible households and businesses, including:

• £500 hardship payments to help with the immediate recovery.
• Up to £5000 grants to help protect homes and businesses from future flooding.
• 100% council tax and business rates relief.
• £2500 grants for small and medium-sized businesses for impacts that can’t be recovered from insurance.

Please call 0345 678 9006 for further information.