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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Well now, the new government taskforce has been set up in the aftermath of last week’s severe flooding in the north of England.  Thousands of homes were flooded in Cumbria as Storm Desmond battered the area and it comes as fresh weather warnings have been issued for part of the region.  Rory Stewart, the Floods Minister, joins me live from Bampton near Penrith and a very good morning to you Mr Stewart.  Well let’s get some more details about this taskforce, who’s on it?  

RORY STEWART: So the taskforce will be composed of people across government and it’s going to be looking at two main things, it’s going to be looking firstly at resilience and how we respond to climate change and the second thing it is going to be looking at is specifically how in Cumbria and Lancashire we mitigate, we reduce the flows, particularly in the upland valleys but we are standing here in something which I think is quite important which is a village called Bampton which is an example of a place where half a dozen houses have been flooded, hasn’t really been in the media and one of the things we really need to get to grips with is this isn’t just a situation that has affected a few big towns but it has affected rural areas right across the north west and making sure that we have a solution that works for them too.  

DM: But isn’t this taskforce just another knee-jerk reaction we get after all these major incidents?  We’ve had reviews, we’ve had reports, surely you must know by now the areas that are at threat and you need to get on with building the defences and preparing how to deal with situations if they don’t work.  

RORY STEWART:  You are right, we need to do both, so we will be spending as you know £2.3 billion on flood defences but we also need to learn lessons.  This was an extraordinary event, nobody was expecting to have 12, 13 inches of rain coming down the river and talking to people who have lived in houses since 1935 who have never seen water at this level, so we need to do both things.  We need to get the defences in place but we also need to think about these extreme and unpredictable events, and particularly on the high fell sides.  A lot of these mountains have half collapsed, landslides, avalanches, what we can do to get more trees planted, what we can do to have more grass absorbing the water before it hits the river.  

DM: Just on the causes, do you agree with your colleague and boss that on these specific events that climate change has to be looked at as one of the causes?

RORY STEWART: We certainly have to look at that.  We are responsible for floods across England and it’s not just a question of river flooding, coastal flooding is going to be a very serious issue and in places like East Yorkshire, the coast is receding by nearly 10 metres a year, that’s 30 feet a year.  We are expecting sea levels to rise, that’s going to be a challenge over time, for example to the Thames Barrier, so we have to look at flooding not just in terms of what we have seen here in Cumbria which is devastating water falling on fell sides down rivers but also what we do for our coastal communities on both the west and east.    

DM: And are you hearing and do you endorse what the Prime Minister said at the beginning of last year just, in 2014, after floods in other parts of the United Kingdom, whatever money needed will be spent.  Is that going to be thrown back in your face because clearly it isn’t?

RORY STEWART: This is absolutely central to my heart.  I live in the north west and we really owe it to the people here to do everything we can. I have been incredibly impressed though by the response so far, I think it’s been simpler, it’s been quicker than we’ve had in the past, that’s true of the emergency services, that’s true of the insurance industry who have been out here much faster than they were in the past and even the government package of support, we announced £50 million almost immediately, that will just be the beginning, we are going to have to spend a great deal on roads and bridges but I have absolutely no doubt, people have been working day and night, there are a lot of very tired people working very hard to deliver and I’ve been very impressed with the response so far.  

DM: People understood the Prime Minister then to be talking in effect about flood defences, whatever money needed will be spent.  That means there is no limit on it, if your taskforce comes back eventually and says it is going to cost billions upon billions upon billions you have to say to them don’t you that there is a limit to the spending?


RORY STEWART: Our spending is pretty large.  I mean £2.3 billion now committed over the next six years, that’s the largest package ever delivered for flood defences and you are right of course, we have to balance that with other responsibilities we have in the United Kingdom but that is a huge amount of money and I think it will make an enormous difference …  

DM: Sorry to interrupt Mr Stewart but that does seem to contradict the Prime Minister’s own words, it’s not whatever money needed will be spent, there is a limit.  There is a pot we understand, there is austerity gripping the country, you can’t just go around spending all this money on flood defences for something which actually might not happen.

RORY STEWART: This is as you know an extreme and unpredictable event and the real challenge isn’t just balancing with other government departments as you say, as you imply you have got to balance with health and education but it is also balancing with other communities throughout the United Kingdom.  So we will be spending £80 million around the Fylde coast, about the same on the Humber, £40 million on the Lincolnshire coast, the real key here is to make sure that this money, this very large sum of money goes as effectively as possible and as far as possible and just to return to my initial point, that we pick up these small communities, that all the attention isn’t just directed towards cities that have suffered in a terrible was like Carlisle or towns like Kendal but also that we pick up these rural areas and that’s going to be very challenging.  

DM: But you’re in government, you have to be honest with people, well we hope you have to be honest with people and you do have to say however many defences we build, they might be in the wrong places, we don’t know given as we discussed the unpredictability of these events, they might happen in areas we haven’t considered and which still might be flooded.  

RORY STEWART: Well you’re right, there is nothing that is as unpredictable as the climate and traditionally of course nothing is as unpredictable as the British climate and what we are dealing with here we’ve never seen before, there have never been records of 12 or 13 inches of rain falling, this has broken all the UK records and of course it’s true that there are certain extreme events which will unfortunately produce water that will go over the top even of a twelve foot wall so we have to be honest about that but there is still an enormous amount we can do.  We can do an enormous amount to slow the water down as it comes down so you don’t have the peaks, there is a great deal we can do to minimise the amount of water to give people more time to plan and prepare but yes, of course you are right, we are dealing with an extreme and unpredictable event.  

DM: Minister, thank you very much indeed for your time, I know how busy you are.  Rory Stewart there in Bampton.