ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO MURNAGHAN, SKY NEWS

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: We are going to try and review the papers now in this breeze, both local and national, of course the floods looming large and indeed the storms. I am joined by two Somerset MPs, Tessa Munt and John Penrose, very good to see you. Let’s give it a go, let’s try waving these papers around and holding on to them, let’s not see them blowing away into the River Parrett. There is a disconnect Tessa, isn’t there, especially when it comes to the Environment Agency, verging on contempt for Chris Smith and the leadership of it but not for the people working on the ground from the Environment Agency.

TESSA MUNT: Oh they’re doing a brilliant job, a brilliant job. Absolutely right and I think probably there is one point that I’d make and that is that those who are focused on enforcing things at this time, they could probably be put on to more positive work. I don't think there’s a complaint about the people whose job it is to do the work on the ground.

DM: People are very glad to see them. What have you picked out Tessa?

TESSA MUNT: Actually this is a very sad story of a beautiful little boy who has died as a result of something, nobody knows quite what.

DM: It could have been something to do with the pumps being used.

TESSA MUNT: Maybe, maybe and if that’s the case … well it relates to flooding and it may also … what concerns me is that there are also 17 other people who have been taken to hospital with vomiting and other serious symptoms and I suppose it’s a real warning that you look at this and people think that water is only a threat in the way that it floods and you could drown but a really big danger of course is things like Weil’s disease and you have to be very, very careful and who knows, when this water is taken away, what will be left.

DM: Well last weekend on Sky News we had some of the water analysed and such as Weil’s disease and the bacteria … it can last for weeks and weeks and weeks can’t it?

TESSA MUNT: Well any river at any time, wherever you have rats there’s a problem.

DM: Absolutely. We have to prioritise don’t we, we have to prioritise spending and we have to make cuts as well and even within the flood defences, the weather defences, you have to decide where the greatest good will be done and that’s the point that Chris Smith was trying to make, Tessa, wasn’t it? He may have made it inelegantly but that choice between town and country, those choices have to be made.

TESSA MUNT: It was a bit clunky but yes, they do and I think the whole point is … clearly Chris Smith is not the man the people want to see. There is a lot of respect, as I said, for the people who work locally but the fact is, yes, there has to be cuts but people are very, very concerned about the fact that large numbers of staff are going and we got to make sure it’s the middle management really and the upper management that is as slim as possible so we can have the flattest possible structure that we can have and then that’s what we have to do.

DM: Some of the consequences are far reaching aren’t they? It’s not just that it will inconvenient to get around for a while.

TESSA MUNT: They are very far reaching. This is all about the levels of the water are very important, the different temperatures in the water, how long it sits on the land and one of the things I was asking for a year ago in parliament is actually what we do, the Environment Agency has six main aims and objectives, of course they are there to protect people and property but their main aims and objectives are related to wildlife and flora and fauna and that sort of thing. Brilliant, great but actually what we ought to do is give them a seventh priority which is to protect productive land and this stuff out here, food security is really important. This is the flood for next year, it’s got to grow on this land which is covered in water.

DM: And locally produced, British produced.

TESSA MUNT: Indeed and that’s what feeds the cattle or the sheep that are on it or whatever and if we don’t protect the land and get the water away … we have a really good system of drainage here that has been here for hundreds of years and it works when it’s done properly.

DM: If we keep it going.

TESSA MUNT: If we keep maintaining it.

DM: Mark Harper on the Telegraph front page, ‘Immigration Minister quits’. What do you make of this Tessa Munt?

TESSA MUNT: Mark Harper has helped me with my constituent’s problems and I think he has fallen on his sword which is utterly honourable. I do wonder if he can’t work out the system how on earth anybody else is meant to, I do not know. If you can’t work out your own paperwork.

DM: So you think this isn’t a great idea then, to get employers to check the backgrounds, to check the status of people they employ?

TESSA MUNT: Yes but I need to know how it is that I know, if I’ve got a letter from the Home Office saying that my cleaner – and I don’t have one but if I did – if I had a cleaner and I had a letter from the Home Office saying this person is good to stay indefinitely, how do I know that letter is for real? How do I know if it’s got a time limit on it? Who comes along and says, sorry, it’s time for you to leave? That’s our real problem with the immigration system, we know who’s coming in but we never know who’s going out.

DM: Tessa, the story about Barclay’s Bank on the front of the Mail, it seems anyone can break in and get these details.

TESSA MUNT: I know, I despair really because the banks, people are pretty unhappy about the banks anyway, we’ve had the interest rates swap agreement, we’ve had goodness knows what else, they move on to other scandals all the time. It is catastrophic for trust in banking and people, anyone that’s responsible has to be dealt with really, really seriously rather than given a pat on the back and don’t do it again. We absolutely have to do something about our banking system.

DM: Okay, we’ll end it there, thank you very much indeed, juggling with blowing papers, soggy papers, phones going off from your constituents and the rain. That’s one of the most entertaining paper reviews I’ve ever done!