Flood Summit

MP brings communities together to tackle flooding  

Working with the Future Flood Resilience Forum, Olly Glover MP brought communities and statutory organisations together to identify ways to protect communities across the constituency from flooding.  

The Didcot and Wantage Flood Summit in East Hanney was attended by Parish Councils, local flood groups. the Environment Agency, County and District Council officers, Thames Water, Network Rail and others with a role in flood prevention and mitigation.  

A presentation about repeat flood events in East Hanney was used as an example to prompt wide ranging discussion how to protect communities from more extreme weather events that are becoming more frequent as a result of climate change.  

Actions identified were wide ranging: upgrading standards new housing developments with flood prevention as a priority, educating landowners about flood management, water treatment wetlands, improved bridges and culverts, enhanced water level monitoring, helping communities set up their own Flood Groups and spreading the word about the resources available to residents and businesses such as the Oxfordshire Flood Toolkit. 

Olly Glover MP said: “There are multiple agencies and landowners with a role to play in flooding, and it is easy to fall into a pattern of blame. The idea of the Flood Summit was to bring the bodies involved and the communities impacted together to better understand the causes and what is being, or could, be done collectively to prevent the devastating impact of flooding. This is an approach I have used on a smaller scale in Didcot Ladygrove, which has resulted in practical actions by Network Rail, local councils and residents to address flooding.  

“I see my role as one of facilitating better communication locally and pushing for changes to national legislation, and funding where it is needed” 

“There was a huge amount of knowledge and expertise in the room at the Didcot and Wantage Flood Summit. Several actions were agreed, and I am working with Barry to keep up the momentum.”  

Barry Gooch of the Future Flood Resilience Forum said: “Bringing the community, regulators, and responsible bodies together in one room has given a shared understanding of the challenges and issues involved. Working alongside Olly we will build on the Summit to quantify the problems being faced and work out how to give our communities a measure of flood resilience.”