Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

With respect, the Government have not cut—[Interruption.] If the hon. Lady would let me answer the question, I would tell her that the total funding of flood defence has risen from £300 million a decade ago to £600 million—[Interruption.] That is the point. In any one year in any one region, big schemes will be in the process of being completed and there will large spending. Such schemes will come to an end, and there will inevitably be an ebb and flow in the expenditure pattern region by region. What really matters is whether the Environment Agency has more resources. It will receive an increase—some of it will go to local authorities—in flood defence spending from £600 million to £800 million in 2010-11, precisely because we have recognised the need for that greater investment. It will mean that the Environment Agency has more money to spend on flood defence and it is also why we have tightened the planning policy guidance and given the Environment Agency the right to be consulted about planning applications.