UK flood defence cuts leave 5m vulnerable homes 'at risk'

Funding for flood defences could be a 'classic example' of a false economy, says report

St Blazey, Cornwall where flooding this month closed the village off and caused havoc. Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA

The government's cuts to the UK's flood defence budgets risk leaving the country's 5m at-risk homes less protected and the poorest communities losing out to richer areas, according to a critical report by MPs.

"Urgent action is needed to ensure that our communities are adequately and effectively protected from flooding," said Anne McIntosh, a Conservative MP and chair of the Environment, Food and Rural affairs select committee.

The increased risk of flooding, such as the floods that swamped homes in Cornwall last month, is due to climate change. Under the last government, spending on flood defences rose 33% in the four years to 2010/1. But the coalition government cut flood-defence spending in the comprehensive spending review.

"Simply to maintain the current level of protection in the face of increasing flood risks requires increased investment and the significant CSR cuts will increase concerns that funding on flood defences remains inadequate," the committee's report concluded, noting the cuts could be a "classic example" of a false economy.

McIntosh said the biggest challenge was whether local authorities would have sufficient money to protect their communities from flooding when the responsibility is passed to them on 1 April next year. Defra and the Department for Communities and Local Government suffered the largest budget cuts in Whitehall. "It's all very well for the government to say we're not ringfencing [local spending], but how do we know they are going to have the money for flood defences," said McIntosh.

Responding to the report, the environment minister Richard Benyon said: "The reality is that central government cannot foot the entire bill for flood defences. We are consulting on a fairer way of allocating funding for flood defences, and by allowing local and private contributions, we can pool resources and make sure projects that local communities want go ahead, and which otherwise wouldn't have happened at all."

But Jamie Reed, the shadow floods minister, said: "The report clearly vindicates our concerns that the level of cuts proposed by the government will leave many communities exposed and vulnerable to flooding. The committee has exposed the risk that the government is taking and how poorer communities will suffer the hardest."

McIntosh said new types of funding needed to be investigated, such as asking developers to contribute to works that benefited them. But the report said: "It is by no means certain that any shortfall in public funding can yet be made up by private contributions." It also said government plans to allow communities to pay part of the cost of flood defences that would not otherwise be funded failed to explain how poorer communities would not be disadvantaged. "It could be deemed to be unfair," said McIntosh. "What we are asking for is clear principles to be agreed to secure funding from all sources to meet the government's flood defences."

There were also concerns about the impact of other Defra cuts, said McIntosh, such as the proposed sell-off of Forestry Commission land , because forests are important in flood prevention. But she added that other projects could be important, including the creation of new bogs in upland areas which could store water. McIntosh represents the flood-prone constituency of Thirsk and Malton in north Yorkshire.

Last night the Met Office said there was a risk of flooding when the current cold spell ends and snow and ice thaws, but that it would depend how quickly temperatures rose and whether it also rained.

The availability of flood insurance has been a serious issue and the last government agreed a "statement of principles" with the insurance industry for universal coverage in return for rising spending on flood defences, which is now not happening. The report says the government must "urgently" reach a new agreement.

The prime minister and the environment secretary, Caroline Spelman, were previously accused of spinning the scale of the cuts, with David Cameron calling the budgets "roughly the same" as before. Spelman then had to clarify the changes were an 8% cut if the previous four years were compared with the next four years. The Environment Agency chair, Lord Chris Smith, and the National Floods Forum, which represents 200 local action groups, used the most recent year as a baseline, making the cuts roughly 25%, or £616m over four years.