Belper Town Council - Labour responded to increased flooding risks.

 I became aware of the changing flood risk in the Derwent Valley whilst working on the NP4B (Neighbourhood Plan for Belper link to AVBC Flood Risk Assessment) and it was apparent that Belper Town Council would have to develop a local response to that increased risk. The 100 year flood event was becoming likely every ten years whilst the ten year event was nigh on annual.

Following Labour taking control of the council in 2019 flooding was duly targeted as a prime task and this initiative was led by Councillor Emma Monkman. This is her brief outline of what has been done:

 Flooding work

Councillor Emma Monkman

When we were elected in May 2019 there was no flood policy or group, despite being a river town. In November 2019 Belper and Milford experienced a significant flood event and it was then that we realised how vulnerable we were in this area. I created the Belper Flood Watch Scheme, recruited and trained volunteer Flood Wardens, and created a flood response fund of £10,000 for the people of Belper and Milford.

I have been working with the Environment Agency, Derbyshire County Council and Communities Prepared to develop a Community Flood Plan for the Town. This is a live document and will constantly need updating which is why we need to be re-elected, no other Party can be trusted with this work.
The next step is to link in with other flood schemes and councils along the River Derwent. This will become the Lower Derwent Flood Forum and together we can ensure flooding makes it to the top of the agenda when the Local Resilience Forum meet and designate priorities.
In November 2019 7 residential properties were flooded, and several business properties including our Mill. Since then, we have had 2 other flood events and each time we are more prepared. With the latest flood event in early 2022 our efforts meant that 2 residential properties were flooded. We need to get that figure to 0 and we are the party to do that.

Now that is indeed a brief outline especially when compared with the welter of procedural documentation, notes of meetings and research that I am aware has been produced to make the Belper Town Council response to this threat. Then there is the hours of support given to local residents or standing on the flooded bridge by the North Mill weir to advise motorists of the best diversionary routing.

The River Derwent flooded its banks in Belper in October 2019. This photo taken as Labour councillors inspected the scale of the flood.

It's not just water

When the Derwent floods our valley it will be accompanied by a release of sewage across the land. In a Derbyshire Live article it is stated that the Derwent is the most polluted river in Derbyshire with 4,931 dumps (36,096 hours) in 2021. Further reading on the Top of the Poops website elicits that much of that discharge is upstream from Belper, Milford and Duffield ............ what gets dumped in Matlock can end up in houses, gardens and fields downstream. The solution to this problem is to re-nationalise the water industry and to bring back control of our environment to government. A town council can do very little in the big scheme of things but Belper Town Council has responded to the challenge and does make a difference.

The privatisation of our rivers 

In 1989  our water – something we all owned – was sold off. Privatisation has largely enriched private shareholders who have done little to invest in this essential public service.

When the water companies were sold off, the government took on their historic debts. Since, they have accumulated over £45bn of debt that is ultimately the responsibility of billpayers or governments.

We were told privatisation could do things more cheaply but water bills rose by 40 per cent in real terms, according to the National Audit Office.

We were promised that privatisation would unlock more investment but less was invested in 2018 than in 1990.

We were told that nationalised industries wasted money, but one water boss took home £2 million after venting 4.2 billion litres of sewage into rivers – over which his firm eventually paid £20 million in fines.

Over a decade, the nine large English companies have paid out as much in dividends as they have made in profits.

All for providing a service in a “market” in which they don’t compete for customers, when fines for non-compliance with drinking-water quality standards have exceeded £1.5 million over the last five years, and where we lose enough water for 20 million people to leaks every day.

It’s hardly surprising that support for public ownership of water, at 83 per cent, is higher than for any other utility. 

Labour has laid out plans for what that public ownership will look like; regional water authorities whose boards comprise local-government representatives, employee representatives and representatives of community, consumer and environmental bodies.

The real expertise sits with the workers who ensure our water arrives reliably and cleanly into our homes.

We want those real experts at the heart of making sure we have environmentally sustainable, safe and affordable water.

Thirty four years on from the Conservatives’ historic mistake we can’t wait for the chance to reverse it.

A report in the Independent in 1994