'Urgent action' needed on Wales flood planning

Communities in Wales need guidance on flooding risks, says the report

The problems of coastal erosion and tidal flooding are not being dealt with quickly enough by the Welsh Assembly Government, according to a report.

The Public Accounts Committee said 2007 plans and an audit office report last year on the impact to coastal communities had not been heeded.

"Urgent action is needed," said Jonathan Morgan AM, chair of the committee.

WAG said more than £42m would be spent this financial year on the problem.

In a statement, the assembly government said funding for flood and coastal erosion risk management in Wales had more than tripled since 1999.

Coastal communities

The Public Accounts Committee criticised the assembly government, saying it had "been slow in implementing change and has yet to effectively communicate the implications of this to coastal communities in Wales".

Coastal areas which were seen as 'high risk' were identified last year

Mr Morgan said: "While the Committee was certainly encouraged by some of the policies and options it heard for protecting our coastline, it was frustrated to hear about the lack of progress towards implementing them."

He said organisations and authorities across Wales were "waiting for a steer from the Welsh Government but the sands of time are running out".

He added: "People on the Gwent levels and Cardiganshire and Clwyd coastlines can't afford to wait and watch the water encroach on their homes and businesses, they need to know what is going to be done to help them."

The auditor general for Wales warned last year that many people living in coastal areas of Wales would need to move because of a serious risk of flooding brought about by climate change.

The report said a "drastic re-think" was needed to the current approach to managing the sea's impact and that Wales would need to move from a strategy based on defending coastlines to a "risk-based approach".

That approach would involve measures including abandoning properties in high-risk areas to the sea.

The audit office report said that the assembly government considered high-risk areas to include coastline between Kimnel Bay and Llandudno in Conwy, Tywyn in Gwynedd, Aberaeron, Aberystwyth and Borth in Ceredigion; and the Gwent levels near Newport in south east Wales.

'Little headway'

The Public Accounts Committee report said that while the assembly government had accepted the need to change its approach, it had made "little headway" in implementing the strategy, and that there was a "lack of clarity" over future direction.

Mr Morgan, writing in the foreword to the report, said: "Urgent action is needed if citizens are going to have sufficient time to plan for what could be major changes to their way of life.

"In the starkest terms, some communities that are currently protected by coastal defences will have to retreat in the future, abandoning property and land to the sea. We may arrive at this position in tens rather than hundreds of years."

The committee's report called on the assembly government to:

• Outline what a risk-based approach would involve and what steps are being taken to implement it
• Communicate the implications of a change of approach to citizens and communities that are at current or future risk
• Create a national strategy for flood and coastal erosion risk management

The Welsh Assembly Government is expected to publish its draft strategy to deal with flooding shortly.

Investment in capital improvement works to deal with coastal flooding is set to increase by 44%, as a result of additional funding from Europe, over the next five years, the assembly government said.

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