SIR Michael Pitt flood report: “Gloucestershire was unprepared”
GLOUCESTERSHIRE was unprepared for last year's disastrous
floods and must make big changes to prevent it happening
again.
That's the view of Sir Michael Pitt, who has today released
his final report.
He has spent almost a year on his independent review and has
made 92 recommendations.
He said the utility companies had failed to pass on crucial
information to the emergency services, making it more difficult
for them to handle the crisis.
The whole country, he said, was ill-prepared for the
exceptional rainfall that meant thousands of people were forced
to move out of their homes. In Tewkesbury borough, there are 79
families still living in caravans and a total of 286 properties
still not fully habitable.
In Gloucester and Stroud dozens of homes are also still
affected by the flood damage.
Sir Michael said: “The report focuses on the perspective of
the victims of flooding – residents, businesses and farmers.
All of the 92 recommendations, in some way, impact beneficially
on the quality of life for people in flood risk areas.”
Most of what appears in Sir Michael's final report was in
his interim report, published in December. Most of the 87
recommendations, including the 15 urgent ones, are largely
repeated now.
Sir Michael said there should be a presumption against
building in high flood risk areas and developers must make a
full contribution to the costs both of building and maintaining
any necessary defences.
He felt the Government was right to be spending £800 million
per year on flooding and stressed that his recommendations were
“reasonable and affordable”.
His report is based on six themes he hopes the Government
will give its general support to.
14 Comments
View all