No, I will not give way, because there are others who wish to speak. The flood defence funding issue in my constituency was not related to cancelled schemes. In fact, the improvements that were expected in my area were not scheduled until 2023, and 2028 in many cases. Our flooding was down to a significant tidal surge, which flooded 350 homes in my constituency. As I have said on numerous occasions, that incident coincided with the death of President Nelson Mandela, so it was not top of the six o’clock news. None the less, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural
Affairs visited, as did the chairman of the Environment Agency. Eleven communities in my constituency were flooded. Some of them, such as Burringham and Keadby, received warnings, but others in South Ferriby and Reedness did not and many people found themselves in quite dangerous situations with water in some cases as high as their waists, and in one case up to their chests. A number of residents were stuck in their properties because they had not been provided with proper warnings.
We had a public meeting in South Ferriby last Monday night; a couple of hundred people turned out. It was a really well attended and good spirited meeting. One thing residents asked me to take back is the issue of flood warnings. A lot of people are elderly and not on the internet. Large parts of my constituency have internet speeds of about one megabit a fortnight, so it is not possible to get the updates. They did not know a warning had been issued in the morning. We did not have a severe warning, and people were not evacuated. The first thing people knew of the problems was when the Humber started pouring through their front doors, which was a frightening experience for elderly people living in bungalows. No one was there to help them, because the flooding was not expected in that community. Had it not been for the parish council and younger, fitter neighbours, a number of residents could have found themselves in an even more distressing situation.
Following that flooding I visited all the communities, but it took me three days to get round them all, given the scale of the flooding across east Yorkshire and north Lincolnshire. At that time I was struck by the response of the emergency services, and of the Environment Agency, which has come in for a lot of stick, but whose dedicated personnel were out there on the front line—maybe not at the time that some residents would have liked them, but in the days afterwards and since then, informing and protecting residents.
I pay a particular tribute to North Lincs council. The flooding happened on the Thursday evening. From the Friday and the Saturday, the council worked with me and my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) on a package of support, which was put in place that Monday morning, of £300 to every home that was flooded and a £1,000 interest-free loan to every resident who had been flooded, repayable over five years, starting six months from the date of the flooding. That package was available and was delivered to people by the end of that week. So within a week they knew the council was there to support them.
I want to say a little about the history of flooding in our area. We know we are likely to flood. I live next to one of our tidal rivers. On 5 December it was about 6 feet higher than my front room; fortunately it did not overtop, but only by an inch or two. We know we live in an area that was drained by Cornelius Vermuyden in the 17th century. It is former marshland. We know the risks we face. That does not mean that we should be written off.