We must improve public awareness of flood risks and build resilience Floods
John Harris has correctly identified that the UK is hopelessly ill-prepared for floods, but it is wrong to suggest the public has not been informed of the threat (Floods and forgotten: UK waters rise as we remain in the dark, 16 November). In fact, the UK has some of the most detailed and accurate flood risk information in the world. The Environment Agency publishes comprehensive flood risk maps and flood impact information, searchable by title, and carries out regular information campaigns.
The north-east of England has also pioneered community flood officers, whose sole aim is to engage with vulnerable communities and encourage the development of ‘community resilience’, a model increasingly mirrored in other regions.
What is puzzling is that these efforts, coupled with extensive coverage of the floods in the media, have had little or no effect on enhancing measures of community awareness or preparedness. A 2016 survey The Environment Agency noted that only 45% of people living in vulnerable areas estimate the risks they are exposed to and only 7% identify any risk to their own property.
Why UK public opinion fails to appreciate the scale of the flood risk challenge is a complex issue, but the widespread centralization and technocratic dominance of engineers and infrastructure-based solutions in flood management (and in environmental management more broadly) plays a powerful role.
In a context where the general public is largely excluded from any role in environmental management or decision-making, simply expecting people to protect themselves is naive. Why would they do it when there is an expectation that someone else will do it for them?
A radical reform of how floods are managed is needed to reconnect people with their aquatic environments and improve public understanding and engagement with floods as a societal challenge. Crucially, this includes transferring flood management powers to local and regional levels, not through the Environment Agency but through effectively funded local authorities.
Our priority must be to build trusted and effective relationships between risk management authorities and communities, help develop a unified understanding of risks, and work with them to manage risks and build resilience by combining infrastructure, nature-based solutions and community activism.
Dr. Ed Rollason
(Kilo in County Durham).
The illustration by Natalie Lees that accompanies John Harris’s article would have made a fitting front cover for Ian McEwan’s new book What Can We Know, in which he presents, in imaginative terms, the outcome of rising floodwaters. It may be essential reading for planning committees.
Moira Robinson
(Kidlington, Oxfordshire).