Floods Bill - Tewkesbury people let down

12.25.00pm GMT Wed 17th Feb 2010

Local residents feel badly let down that the Conservative MP for Tewkesbury failed to support crucial measures to enable people in flood risk areas to get decent insurance and to allow councils to stop building in flood risk areas.

The new Floods Bill which is going through Parliament lacks real teeth. In particular, it does not deal with the problem of enabling householders in flood risk areas to get decent home insurance or the need to give councils the power to stop building in flood risk areas.

Therefore Cheltenham Liberal Democrat MP Martin Horwood proposed two changes to the Floods Bill:-

• A requirement on the government to take action on insurance, so that people in flood risk areas can get reasonable insurance without rocketing premiums, punitive excess charges or ridiculous exclusions.

• Giving councils powers to refuse planning permission to build new housing in flood risk areas. This is vital to protect people from future flooding, both in new housing and in nearby housing due to the risk of water running off from what used to be green fields.

Unfortunately, the Conservatives, including the MP for Tewkesbury, failed to vote for either of these particular changes. Without this support the proposed changes were doomed.

Alistair Cameron, Liberal Democrat Prospective MP for Tewkesbury said:

'If elected, I will make it a priority to get a new Floods Bill introduced with specific measures to enable people in flood risk areas to get decent insurance and to give councils powers to stop building in flood risk areas. I also want to see long-term plans introduced to build up spending on flood alleviation to the levels needed to deal with the threat from climate change.'