Environment Agency
Minette, thank you. It is the greatest possible pleasure to be here.
I must say not many peoplehave had the privilege of being set up for this discussion both by your president and by the Prime Minister in union this morning, and Im sure that will give you opportunity for some challenging questions as we go along, as they both encouraged.
I regret to say that Im not a farmer. But my father was. My father was a dairy farmer. And all my grandparents and great grandparents were farmers on the Hampshire/Wiltshire border. And my uncle Charlie was farming on Canvey Island in the Thames Estuary in 1953. You can take it that I get farming and I get flooding.
I also get the vital nature of food production. And I was so pleased to hear your President this morning say that she regards food production and a healthy environment as two sides of the same coin. That is the basis on which I would like to be forging the relationship between the Environmental Agency and the agriculture sector.
We are in tough times I need hardly say that, with growing increasing temperatures. Youre familiar with these graphs, I think. But one that particularly stands out for me is this one which shows anomalies divergence from the average over the last 80 years, with the 40s and 50s in blue, the 60s and 70s in pink, the noughties in red but 2023 way out on its own.
It was a very disturbing year for the climate. And I could show you a similar graph, this is air temperature, but I could show you similar for water temperature and for Antarctic ice. And as we all know, increases in temperature have a disproportionate effect on humidity.
Thats relevant to us in the Environment Agency because, although we do some other important work on waste management and air quality, our primary focus is water. Flood, drought, and water pollution. And of course, all three of those are vital to you as well.
Lets start with flood. I know that many of you have experienced devastating flood and drought events, and I know that it can take a huge financial and emotional toll upon you and your families including some devastating long term mental health impacts. And we will never forget that.
This winter has been appalling. I have been around the country a fair bit. Top left is a 1600-acre farm in Lincolnshire, entirely underwater apart from the farm and farm buildings on a little island in the middle.
The three months at the end of last year was the wettest that weve had in this country since 2000 and the third wettest since 1871. I am very proud of how the Environment Agency dealt with those floods. But Id also like to pay tribute to the NFU who worked closely with us to help warn and inform farmers during those record events. And to farmers yourselves for the support you provided for local communities in those times of flooding.
We do want to help you to adapt, improve resilience and thrive despite the greater climate challenges that are coming. Protecting farmland is one of the key outcomes for our 5.2 billion over six years flood and coastal investment programme. We know that there is aperception that the vast majority of our investment in flood defences goes to protect urban populations. And its true that flat schemes must be measured against the impact on people, and quite right too. But that does not mean that we dont protect rural communities. And as the Prime Minister mentioned this morning, approximately 40% of our schemes and 45% of the value investment better protects rural communities. And since 2015, our investments have better protected over 400,000 hectares of agricultural land.
One aspect is watercourse maintenance which you care about. The NFU is calling for proactive management plans from the Environment Agency, controlling water courses and flood defences. But it is important to us to recognise that our water courses also fulfil other roles including water for obstruction, corridors for nature and providing opportunity for navigation and leisure. Its not as simple as it may sound.
In 2022 and 2023 we spent over 200 million pounds, maintaining flood risk assets. And Im glad to say that rose by 25 million this year. Asset Management vision and plans programme are published online, and we really do prioritise maintenance work that on assets to provide the greatest flood risk benefits.
We know that many of you would like to see more dredging. Its not as clear cut as it seems, for a number of reasons. One, that the amount of extra volume that you can create doesnt actually go very far compared with the vast areas of water that we have suffered.
And second, Im sure you will see that unless you dredge or get open water all the way to the sea, it really doesnt help very much. Its not always the best solution. We do take it seriously. We consult with locals, the IDBs and local farmers, local communities, about whether its the best way ahead and we shall continue to do so. But there is a limit to it.
Demaining is another thing that you would like to see, and I think many of you will have heard my views on this. I favour it. I think that generally the use of local experience, expertise and equipment is good. But again, its not quite as simple as that. We carried out a series of pilots in 2018 and across those locations, they did generally do a good job and encouraged us to look for others, but there are challenges including financial responsibility. The process remains complex and time consuming but trust me we will be looking at it and I shall back it where we reasonably can.
But there are other ways. Public sector cooperation agreements, particularly where we work with the internal drainage boards are really important. We have 40 of those in place, and there will be more to come. And the announcement today is incredibly helpful on this. 75 million has been allotted by the government today for us to work with IDBs, both to repair some of their equipment which has been damaged in the recent floods, but also to do more looking forward. And that can include opportunity for demaining. So, I was quite delighted to hear that announcement from the Prime Minister this morning.
I also want to make sure that you know that you can do it if you want to. You, theriparian owners, have the responsibility for looking after these rivers. We have powers as well, but you can carry out appropriate maintenance. We shall encourage that wherever we can. I know that of course on major schemes, you need permits, and we can talk about permitting later. I think we are on the case with that. But above all use common sense. You use common sense on work, and we shall use common sense too.
So, a big issue is using land for flood storage. And in some locations, thats the best solution. And of course, as your president has already mentioned, you feel that it is often provided at great cost and that you want to be paid fairly for that, with agreements put in place to enable it to run smoothly.
We will support where flood storage areas are seen to be appropriate as part of a flood risk management solution. But to be clear, we cant use public flood money for areas that are already natural floodplains. There are other routes particularly through ELMs, which can support that, but we cant use government flood money for it. But I was in Lincolnshire recently with the Secretary of State, and he asked us to look at this and how we can work with locals, local groups and internal drainage boards to see where we can take it further forward.
Working with farmers and landowners is a vital part of our flood and coastal erosion management strategy roadmap up to 2026. And its a priority for us to help farmers and land managers to adapt their practices to be more resilient to the changing climate. And with the NFU weve committed to working together to quote establish a rural resilience partnership focused on helping farmers and land managers adapt to a changing climate. And were really looking forward to seeing what we can collectively achieve as we develop and plan that partnership with the other partners identified here.
We need to drive innovation in this field. In September 2023, we launched a 25 million ring fence fund for natural flood management. It was open to farmers and to local communities. Im delighted to say that there was a fantastic response to it, and the successful projects will be announced on Friday, but we are quite delighted with the response received.
Were also investing 150 million in the flood and coastal resilience innovation programme to develop, test and implement practical and innovative resilient actions in 25 local areas. And one of those wonderful project Reclaim the Rain is a nice example of a primarily flood project, which also can help water resources. Its working with large scale food producers.
And I would like to move on to the subject of water resources, because although much attention at the moment is focused inevitably on flood and on water quality, its actually water resources that most bothers me.
A combination of population growth, climate change, and movement of people to the southeast could leave us 4 billion litres a day short in this country of water.
That is a horrifying prospect. We do see a way of dealing with it. Roughly, Im using big numbers here, but trying to deal with that 4 billion litres a day, we can see thatnew capital schemes, reservoirs and water transfer systems can provide two billion. If we can fix one third of the leakage, thatll save one. And if we can drive down consumption from about 140 litres a day to 110, that will save two.
But none of those are easy. That makes for five, but I would not want to rely on it. And if we dont get there, then inevi