Watton & Saham Flood Action Group                            FRE0040

Written evidence submitted by the Watton & Saham Flood Action Group to the Environment Audit Committee about Flood Resilience in England

Submitted by the Chair, Liz Whitcher, of the Watton & Saham Flood Action Group, based in Breckland District in Mid Norfolk. Ms Whitcher is a resident who has not been flooded and leads the Group which consists of 3 Parish Councillors and 4 residents who have been flooded or are at risk of surface water flooding. Our MP is George Freeman who is a great supporter of community action on flooding, has helped our Group, and has made representations in Parliament about the measures needed to mitigate flood risk. We are fortunate that Norfolk County Council established the Norfolk Strategic Flooding Alliance (NSFA) in 2021 after much of the county was flooded at Christmas 2020. The NSFA has succeeded in getting the many diverse agencies concerned with flooding and water supply in Norfolk to work together and there is much that can be learned from them. The first independent Chair was Lord Dannatt who has spoken in Parliament about what would help.

We have answered the questions that we relate strongly to.

Strengthening Flood Resilience

  1. To what extent are current flood resilience assets and interventions fit-for-purpose and what are the strengths and weaknesses?

 

Introduction

  1. We wish to emphasise that small communities have little chance of intervention, and to give our experience as an example to influence the Government so that other small communities may gain some intervention.
  2. We would not be as informed as we are about who does what and how to engage with them if it were not for fortnightly Zoom sessions put on during Covid by the National Flood Forum (NFF), a national charity working with flooded communities. About 40 leaders of flood groups met virtually and learned from expert speakers about many subjects related to flooding and addressing its challenges. The NFF continues to be a huge resource to those of us in flooded communities and they alerted us to this request for evidence.
  3. Here is a link to our website although we struggle to keep it up to date:

 

https://wattonsahamfloodaction.org.uk/

 

Here is a link to a presentation given to the NFF in November 2021:

Background

  1. Our communities are small (less than 10,000 people) and at risk from surface water flooding. This has occurred on several occasions – summer storms in 2009, 2016, 2020, Christmas 2020 and the various storms of 2024. We learned early on that the composition of the soil is a critical feature. Here, there is a large boulder clay layer close to the surface above the chalk and this allows water to drain away only very slowly. So, when the soil is already saturated, the rainwater just flows off it onto the roads and into properties. The same happens when the soil is very dry.
  2. We estimate that more than 100 homes are at risk from surface water flooding as some people don’t report to the Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA) as they are concerned that they may not be able to sell their homes in the future. Indeed, we know of several examples where people did not declare they had been flooded and new homeowners only discovered when they moved in and were told by their neighbours. The new declaration on the search form which asks about flooding should help with that.
  3. The Environment Agency is not involved with interventions as our small Watton Brook, while classed as a main river, does not contribute significantly to property flooding. We have several watercourses which do. Many of these have been filled in over the years or are not maintained. Some are the responsibility of homeowners who have no idea of their riparian responsibilities.
  4. While the LLFA has enforcement powers, they prefer to have local neighbours try to persuade those who refuse to undertake their riparian responsibilities, as enforcement involves legal proceedings which are costly. We do try persuasion but are not always successful.
  5. It would be helpful if the Government could find some way to enforce this without the prohibitive and time-consuming legal processes.
  6. So, we have had to pursue the LLFA relentlessly with appreciation of their need to prioritise larger communities with risks from rivers and the sea, to get some action. We have also helped other small communities in Norfolk to get action. One example is the newly formed Church Road Ketteringham Flood Group, a small village in South Norfolk, led by Jane Witt. We are a testament to wilful individuals in the community willing to work with and not blame the agencies, in order to get action from them. We are aware that in our communities, people tend to blame others and there is little understanding of who does what in relation to flooding. We have had a steep learning curve in relation to this (see paragraph y). The Parish Councils in some cases know no more than residents do and, as volunteers themselves who work or have other commitments, they don’t have the time to find out.
  7. Using our experience and that of other Flood Action Groups, we would like the Government to publish a handbook for flooded communities on who to contact about what.
  8. Due to that work with the LLFA and Anglian Water over the past 7 years since we were founded, we now have 3 funded projects in place for mitigation of flood risk.

 

Funded Interventions

  1. The first is now complete. It was a £10m investment by Anglian Water. They said “The new pipes along with the new pumping station will reduce the risk of flooding in Watton by sending flows directly to the recycling centre. It’s also part of our commitment to supporting new homes in the area, making sure they’re connected to a reliable water and sewerage network while protecting the environment.”
  2. The improvements included building a new storm tank at the Recycling Works which cost £850,000. The site is now able to capture and hold more than a million litres of rainwater to protect the environment during heavy rainfall. By expanding the system’s ability to manage heavy rain and storm events, the risk of untreated wastewater spills has been reduced, offering greater protection to the watercourses in Watton and the surrounding area. Hopefully it will also reduce the number of foul sewer drain covers surcharging and spreading effluent onto the roads and into people’s gardens and the backing up of toilets and baths with effluent such that residents have had to go to the Sports Centre to take a shower (see photo of a bath with effluent in it on the website).
  3. A second is called Reclaim the Rain and is funded by the previous Government’s Flood & Coastal Resilience Innovation Programme (FCRIP). It is managed by Norfolk and Suffolk County Councils and involves three small rural communities in each county, Watton being one of the ones in Norfolk. There are 3 possible interventions, two of which still have to be costed and assessed as meeting the budget. The one that is going ahead is work in the 3 schools in Watton which have been flooded in the past. Some of the funding is from the Department for Education and some SuDS to take the roof water and release it gradually into the drainage system has already been installed. Other measures are planned and will involve the children also learning about the value of water, about flooding and about climate change etc. The second is the installation of a reservoir on a farmer’s land which will protect his land from flooding in heavy rain while providing water in times of drought and protecting areas of Watton that flood. The third is a project in the High Street to hold back water that flows off the roofs onto the road which then floods and can flood businesses. The plan is also to have a tank that will hold the rainwater for use by the contractor who waters all the planters and hanging baskets in the town and uses 80,000 litres per annum.
  4. Please ensure that the Government learns from this project about storing flood and rainwater as a useful resource in times of drought (East Anglia is the driest region in England) while at the same time mitigating flooding. The project ends in 2027 when the main findings will be available. Ongoing information can be found at their website:

https://www.reclaimtherain.org/

 

  1. How appropriate is the current balance between ‘green’ nature-based solutions and ‘grey’ hard infrastructure resilience assets, and, what  adjustments, if any, are needed to improve it?

 

 

  1. In small rural communities like ours, natural flood management has a key role to play. Saham Toney village is being protected by leaky dams across the headwaters of two streams that have flooded the village in the past. After flooding again happened during the 2024 storms, these are being augmented by attenuation ponds which will hold large volumes of rainwater during heavy rain and storms. We applaud the community-minded landlords who have allowed these structures to be built on their land.
  2. We also know of one scheme in our region (Hempnall Parish Council) where farmers were encouraged to farm in different ways to prevent rainwater from their fields pouring onto the roads and flooding a small rural community. The officers who carry this out are called Catchment Sensitive Farming Advisers, but they are few and far between and we consider them a very valuable resource. We would use them here.
  3. We would like the Government to find funds for these roles as they prevent flooding.

 

  1. What changes to the planning system and building regulations are needed to ensure that buildings and infrastructure are resilient to flooding in the short, medium and long-term?

 

 

  1. We firmly believe that more joined-up thinking about land use is needed. We live beside farmers who produce food for the country but in the past, several speculative developers from other parts England, have bought farmland, promising to get planning permission and thus improve the value of the land. We understand why famers might do this.
  2. However, several of these sites were known to flood and were refused by the Breckland Council Planning Committee. The developers appealed and three were subsequently built, one of which, Hazel Grove, was badly flooded in 2020 while still being under construction.
  3. Permission for this was given in 2016 before the establishment of the LLFA. So, there was no evidence of previous flooding, and the Planning Inspector was not permitted to take local people’s evidence, even with photos, into account. A second such development, Wayland Fields, is still being completed and the flood problems and foul sewer problems were part of what led to the Anglian Water investment mentioned in paragraphs i and j above.
  4. We are also concerned that Building Control carry out no inspections of either large developments or property extensions to ensure that the developers have built what their conditions required them to do. Instead, developers self-determine that they have. This is particularly important in relation to drainage and Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS).
  5. We are also very aware that our LLFA is understaffed. There are 15 members of staff, 4 of whom are involved in assessment of the SuDS proposals on the many large developments that are submitted each year. And the Government is wanting to build more homes so they will still be very busy with that role. Two are employed to manage the Reclaim the Rain project mentioned in paragraph k which leaves only 9 officers dealing with the large number of flooding incidents throughout the county. So, it is no wonder that small communities like ours suffer delays before the situation can be assessed and actions proposed. These officers then have to write grant applications for funding and that in itself is time-consuming.
  6. We would like the Government to insist that Building Control do such inspections for drainage and SuDS on all sites and that they ensure that LLFAs have sufficient staff to do their vital jobs.
  7. We also firmly believe that the water companies should become statutory consultees when major developments are under consideration. Anglian Water were not able to say that they would not connect the Wayland Fields development to their network and so the problems, outlined in paragraph r above, ensued.

 

Co-ordination of flood resilience

 

6. What should the key priorities be for the Flood Resilience Task Force and how can it enhance coordination and improve flood resilience?

 

 

Watton is a small town, with a population of less than 10,000, and Saham Toney is a small village to the north of Watton.

 

  1. We think there is a need for community-based response teams, but it is very difficult to attract the volunteers needed for such a scheme. Most volunteers are retired folk, as working families have no time as they juggle the demands of work and family life. In addition, people forget about any kind of crisis until it happens again. We would divide the town up into streets and small areas where flooding has occurred and try to get lead residents in each area to take responsibility for informing others about the looming risk fed down to them from a central co-ordination team using hand-held radios as they are more reliable than mobile phones. Thanks to attendance at the NFF Zoom meetings mentioned in paragraph ii, we are signed up with the Flood Forecasting Centre which sends emails about flood risk. This helps the Group to decide whether a flood warning should be issued. This is a more reliable source than the Environment Agency’s warnings for our communities that suffer from surface water flooding.
  2. We are working with our Parish Councils to encourage them to take responsibility for building this resource as our District Council will only respond to requests for moving people out of flooded homes and providing temporary accommodation. This is again because of the lack of resources that they have. The County Council is encouraging communities to be resident-led in having a resilience plan in place. Some of the paperwork is a bit bureaucratic and long-winded. A very simple plan would be ideal.

 

10. What support do property owners and neighbourhoods require to enhance their resilience to flooding?

 

 

  1. Our experience is that the level of awareness is extremely low. Also, people don’t understand that they are responsible for ensuring that their properties are flood resilient. In addition, not all insurance companies ensure that the reinstated property is made more resilient (Build Back Better) and people don’t know that they can require that.
  2. The FloodRe scheme needs to be extended beyond its projected life as England has seen more flooding than ever before in 2024. Most members of the public have no idea about who deals with flooding and with resilience measures. And our experience is that it is a complex field and that the authorities tend to be reluctant to communicate with their communities. The Chair took part in another FCRIP project in East Sussex called Walk in my Wellies that considered the barriers to communication between authorities and communities and what might improve that. They are planning to publish an academic paper about this, and the Government should also learn from that project. It is very difficult to find out who deals with what and we have been on a steep learning curve about this over the 7 years of our existence. And even now, we have learned about a new department at the County Council who deal with clearing culverts under the roads as that has been delegated to them by the Highways department.

 

 

January 2025