'Urgent Action' Needed on Flooding

The Flooding Review by Sir Michael Pitt into this year's unprecedented flooding in Britain has now been published and strongly recommended that 'planning for flooding should have the same priority as terrorism or flu prevention' from the Government downwards, and also 'urged local government and emergency services to improve their knowledge and practices'.

As the BBC report:

'The review looked at the lessons to be learnt from the floods and highlights a long list of failings.

They include:

- no national flood emergency plan

- no clear responsibility for dealing with urban flooding

- no systematic stockpiling of emergency equipment, such as boats.

According to the report, the floods in June and July led to the biggest loss of critical infrastructure since World War II.

It said flooding is only likely to get worse and society needs to adapt.'

"We're all facing up to climate change and there are all sorts of implications for the country in terms of having to adapt to that change," Sir Michael Pitt said.

"As the report explains, during May, June and July this was the highest level of rainfall we've ever recorded in this country since the 18th Century, so understandably there were very high volumes of water and big implications for emergency services."

'The drainage systems were overloaded, and there needed to be an urgent review of underwater rescue attempts as there was "ambiguity" surrounding procedures. '

"That needs to be sorted out and that is one of our urgent recommendations".


This Report is a timely one indeed for Ribbleside residents concerned about our existing floodrisk...

...and a time when local residents in Penwortham are concerned that the new proposals just announced to build 400 new houses on Factory Lane in Penwortham must not include any intention to build on an area of Sports pitches on Vernon Carus (which we understand are intended to be kept) NOR on any of the Green Belt and operational floodplain helping to protect our local communities from flooding...

...and at a time when Riversway Councillor Jack Davenport is to raise the issue of the need to assess the state of the drainage system in Preston at this week's full Council meeting - a meeting where Council Leader Ken Hudson is also due to make an official announcement about the Council's decision not to pursue the Ribble barrage...

You can read the Pitt Interim flooding report in full
or see the Pitt Review Executive Summary here.

contact us at savetheribble@tiscali.co.uk