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Weston MP to be shown the new construction work on Congresbury Yeo flood defences

August 21 2009

On Wednesday 26th August, Weston-super-Mare MP John Penrose will inspect the advance work to a section of the Congresbury Yeo bank to the North of the river at Mendip View Farm that is especially vulnerable to breaching.

The building of a full flood defence scheme for the Congresbury Yeo tidal banks has been approved as part of the Severn Estuary strategy and is expected to start at the end of 2010, but because of the serious risk of flooding, urgent repair works are being carried out in the intervening period.

Speaking before the visit, John said:

"I look forward to seeing the advance work being carried out and meeting some of the people involved in the planning and consolidation process. I hope it will be a taste of the much more comprehensive re-building of the flood defences along the river that has been promised by the Minister.

"The current defences are beginning to crumble and the Environment Agency itself has admitted that they are near the end of their life. If they were to fail, hundreds of homes and local businesses would be at risk including Congresbury, Kewstoke, Sand Bay, Wick St Lawrence, St Georges, parts of Worle as well as villages from the north bank of the river all the way up to Clevedon.

"Local residents have understandably been very worried about this for some time and I had to press the case for new flood defences with the Minister and the Environment Agency repeatedly to get some results. We had to campaign long and hard to obtain a clear commitment to rebuild the river's flood defences from them but it's wonderful that we've now achieved victory on this.

"It was announced that proper structural work will start next year to re-build the flood defences, but it will take some time before the project is completed and I'm pleased that in the meantime the Environment Agency is regularly monitoring the defences and undertaking emergency repairs where needed."