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11.58 am
Mrs. Claire Curtis-Thomas (Crosby): My constituency is bounded by approximately 30 miles of coastline. Two of our communities--Formby and Hightown--are under threat. Formby is bounded by extensive woodland and faces significant erosion. It also contains a site of special scientific interest and has world status for its dune structure. However, the site faces many difficulties. Three or four miles down the coast, Hightown faces different problems. Formby has no property directly on the coastline, but in Hightown there are properties 200 ft from the shore. We are starting to contemplate the influence of climate change and rising sea levels on those two distinct communities.
During the past six months, Sefton council has got to grips with the difficult task of constructing a coastal management plan and a shoreline management plan. Both plans have been produced. They are 90 pages long and have been distributed to more than 100 organisations.
Opinions are being sought from everyone, from individuals with a vested interest in the development of the shore to societies such as the RSPB and myriad organisations. Therein lies a problem. Many of the individuals concerned are producing reports and views on the plans that will need to be collated before another plan is produced. There are conflicting views about how best to develop the shoreline and the different vested interests confuse matters. It would help enormously if we could rationalise the number of individuals involved. I continually ask who are the experts who will decide how to proceed and wherein lies their expertise.
I welcome the fact that the Government's response to the report says that they are considering an integrated coastal zone management plan. Many of our local
problems have been exacerbated by what is going on further along the coast adjacent to Sefton. Unless there is some attempt to integrate the various agencies along the coastline, many of us will be the victims of other people's protection.
A new development has been built in Southport, which is essential if we are to defend the economy and let the resort prosper, but it has exacerbated problems in Hightown. In the past, we could protect the small community of only 1,000 people in approximately 700 houses because there was a reasonable rate of erosion that could be managed by the dumping of sand; but now we simply cannot cope with the rate at which sand is being removed.
We seek sustainable solutions for some parts of the coastline and hard solutions for others. I expect that we will find sustainable solutions for Formby, provided that we can agree. English Nature, along with another 40 agencies, manages the Formby coastline. It is set on taking at least half the pine woods away in an attempt to develop the dune structure, but we do not think that it has developed coherent arguments to justify that and many people in my constituency firmly believe that it will reduce our flood defences even further.
Until we have expert opinions that can be accepted by the different factions in the community, the region will be insecure and lack the confidence to develop inward investment, albeit on a small scale. Hightown was allowed to develop. It is a lovely, attractive, isolated community. It is quite perfect: lovely modern houses and flats, protected, for the most part, by bluff sand dunes.
Most of the residents do not know what is happening behind the sand dunes, but many do. The dunes are being eroded more or less daily. Sea levels rising between 4 mm and 6 mm, every year for the next 50 years, can bring nothing but disaster for the community. We will need about £8 million to construct a hard sea defence to protect the residents of Hightown.
I understand that, in return for being allowed to build the properties in the area, the developers contributed £800,000. That is nothing in comparison with the cost of the defences that we will have to construct to protect the properties in the long term. I would commend any action that invites the developers to play a greater role in the defence of the properties before they are allowed to build.
Mr. Andrew Tyrie (Chichester):
I strongly agree with what my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) said about the report and about the fact that there has been some mutual self-congratulation by the authors, but as I am not an author I can congratulate them in all sincerity from some distance.
I have a constituency interest because Selsey was flooded just over a year ago. That was my introduction to this issue. I have had lengthy exchanges with the Minister, and I thank him very much for his courtesy and for the time that he has taken to listen to my concerns. By that alone, he has shown what is required to help to allay some local concerns.
Despite the Government's response to the report, I do not think that we will get the cost-benefit analysis that we need. First, the relationship between spending on maintenance and on capital needs to be considered. We are in a catch-22 situation in Selsey, as in many other areas, where money spent on maintenance comes from a budget that could ultimately be used to build permanent sea defences. That seems a crazy situation. I am also worried that the spending on Selsey could delay work on the Chichester flood relief scheme, and I seek an assurance from the Minister that that will not be the case.
Secondly, I am concerned that no serious consideration is being given to overall revenue flows from land that could be lost through strategic retreat. For example, there is a caravan site in Selsey that generates large revenues for the Exchequer, but I understand that those revenues, which could be lost, are not put into the pot to work out the cost-benefit of the proposed strategic retreat. The owner is not being given the opportunity even to say whether he would put up some private cash to maintain his site.
Thirdly, there is compensation. At first sight, compensation seems to be merely an issue of fairness, but in fact it is again a matter of cost-benefit analysis. To work out whether land should be lost, one must determine its value, which should be reflected in the compensation offered to the owner. A constituent recently wrote and said that, before the 1950s, he had been able to choose what to do with sea defences on his land--it was caveat emptor--but that now he has been told that he has no choice and that the land may be lost without his getting any compensation. The Government will eventually have to deal with that unacceptable situation.
Mr. Norman Baker (Lewes):
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate on a matter of considerable importance to my constituency. I approach the issue unashamedly from a constituency angle. I have tried to find out why essential flood defence works for the coast at Seaford and in Lewes town are not being funded. I asked the Library for information about the funding of flood defence works and it provided a helpful diagram.
Mr. Tom King:
We need a screen.
Mr. Baker:
If we had a screen, I could project the diagram for the House. It demonstrates the intricacies of the funding arrangements and the problems that exist. Lord de Ramsey, the chairman of the Environment Agency, wrote to me on 15 February admitting that
I shall explain the position in Seaford and Lewes by means of a quotation from another letter from Lord de Ramsey. He says:
I am also concerned about the banks of the Ouse in Lewes. According to the Environment Agency, there is a real danger that the banks will collapse, with all sorts of consequences for properties, business and tourism in the county town. The works that have been identified as essential by the Environment Agency will not proceed in 2000-01. They have been put back further and we do not even have a date for a proper assessment by the flood defence committee of when the work will be incorporated into its budget plan. Lewes and Seaford will be left defenceless because of the myriad arrangements for funding that apply to flood defence work.
"we have an overall shortfall of some £4M in the funding which Flood Defence Committees have made available for 1999/2000."
24 Feb 1999 : Column 341
His letter continues:
The problem seems to be that the Environment Agency, as the body responsible for assessing what work needs to be done, has determined that certain works should be done in my constituency, but the flood defence committee has elected not to fund those works. That leaves my constituents in an impossible situation. The county council's response to that--and it is the local authority members on the flood defence committees who have voted not to fund the work properly--is that levies from external bodies should be exempted when decisions on budget capping are being considered. I would be grateful if the Minister would respond to that specific point.
"Under current arrangements for funding Flood Defence the Agency has no powers to interfere in the democratic process whereby Flood Defence Committees approve their levies."
"In addition, although the whole Flood Defence Committee endorsed the Agency plan for the coming 12 months, the voting Local Authority members felt that they could not meet the full levy requirement to fund the work. As a result, the levy settlement was cut from an 8 per cent. increase to 6.3 per cent., with a recommendation that major sea defence maintenance at Seaford be halted. Seaford is at the bottom of the Sussex Ouse below Lewes. Any problems or failure of the sea defences here have serious implications for Seaford, nearby Newhaven and Lewes."
A press release issued by the Environment Agency on 9 December after the flood defence committee had agreed not to fund the necessary work stated that it would mean that
"essential maintenance will halt. The Agency will be unable to carry out work at Seaford which it considers is essential to the security of the Ouse Valley."
That is worrying indeed and I have written to the Minister, who has kindly replied, on the general subject of the funding of flood defence committees. I do not underestimate the Government's difficulties in trying to deal with the situation, but the Minister will understand that my concerns arise from my constituents' concerns. In Seaford, essential work to protect the coast and properties along the beach will not take place this year, despite the fact that the Environment Agency has deemed it essential for the security of the Ouse valley. All those properties will be left unprotected this year, because the flood defence committee has not voted through the money. That is an irresponsible position, but the consequences for my constituents is that they are unprotected, and that is unsustainable.
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