Even though sunshine records are being broken at the moment, the nightmares for those whose homes were affected by record rainfall earlier this year continue and seem unlikely to end.
Local authorities have a statutory duty to review what happened when floods occur and properties are damaged. One such authority was Central Bedfordshire council (CBC), in the middle of the government’s growth corridor between Oxford and Cambridge. Its recent report into Storm Henk, which caused widespread flooding in January, said the cause was heavy rain on saturated ground overwhelming drains, sewers and streams.
There was, however, no reference to the thousands of houses, huge warehouses and estate roads that have been built at an unprecedented pace in the area even before the government’s new growth plans materialise.
Fields used to absorb and hold flood water, but now when it rains all these hard surfaces discharge runoff straight into old drains, water courses and sewers that are overwhelmed. Those who live downstream, whose homes were never previously flooded, find themselves in the firing line with every exceptional storm.
Curiously the report by CBC, whose councillors permitted all this expansion with no apparent provision to protect downstream settlements from flooding, makes no mention of the issue.
