Speeches by Hardy.

“The hon. Lady raises a really interesting point—it is perhaps worrying how interested I am getting in what we can do with manure and human waste to provide organic fertiliser in our country. She has given a brilliant example of what can be done, and I will make sure that the Minister who is responsible for the circular…”

“My hon. Friend is absolutely right to be angry about the state in which our rivers, lakes and seas have been left, and I recognise the trouble that a failing water company causes for his constituency. That is why we have committed to resetting, reforming and revolutionising the water sector and why we are establishing …”

“I commend my hon. Friend for his successful championing of this issue on behalf of his constituents. I know how much it means to his community to have such boats removed. It is an important issue, and I am more than happy to follow up with the Canal & River Trust in order to understand if it needs any additional to…”

“We are investing a record amount of money, the most money that has ever been invested by any Government into flood defences. We are investing £2.65 billion over the next two years. We have put money into maintenance, the most money, again, that has ever been put into maintenance. We are investing £4.2 billion over the …”

“No.”

“No, this is genuinely about me looking at the best way to do this. You are right, this piece of legislation was written 15 years ago. It is right that we look at the best way to do this now. Are we looking at doing it with partnership projects? As I say, water companies are hugely interested in this because it helps th…”

“I have a huge amount of respect for Flooded People UK and the trauma that they faced as a flooded community. I am interested to talk to them about their experiences and how we can better support people recovering from flooding. However, do I stand by the figures we are using? Absolutely.”

“We are looking at whether they need a statutory responsibility. I went to see them in Liverpool at their training centre, which was amazing and incredible. The fire service was showing me some of the work they do with rescuing people from flooding, the boats that they use and the dog, Luna, who was very sweet and went …”

“What is the phrase? You might say that but I could not possibly comment.”

“The short answer is that you can either enact schedule 3 or you can achieve the same outcome in a different way. We are genuinely looking at whether the same outcome could be achieved for SuDS rather than enacting schedule 3. I have been a huge fan of SuDS for a long time, recognising how crucially important they are, …”

“The previous Government had a straightforward funding formula based on numbers of properties protected. The difficulty with that particular formula is it made it hard for natural flood management, because it was hard to evidence that you had moved from one risk band to another. If you put a wall up or you do an enginee…”

“Forty-three were implemented, 40 were implemented with work ongoing in 2012, six were ongoing with work on track, and only one was not completely implemented or taken forward.”

“As Phil mentioned, you are quite right, the Pitt review said that there should be an overview role. The Environment Agency was given that strategic overview role over all the different types of flooding. The EA interacts with all the different bodies that are responsible for looking at flooding. As Phil mentioned, they…”

“For example, if we were to put in a new flood defence somewhere, it would be shown through the modelling to reduce the risk for that area. The EA has done an important piece of work there.”

“The EA’s strategic overview role is different, as Phil said, from its operational role managing flooding from rivers and seas. As Phil also explained, it does not have the operational role for surface water flooding; that is done by the lead local flood authorities and the councils, because they should be responsible f…”

“Yes, which is why I am saying the evidence that we have had from the Environment Agency is so important. If you are going to set a baseline for how many properties are at risk, that is what it is mapping. What it has done is crucial. As I said, previously that did not include surface water risk. Some people are saying …”

“Yes, I agree with you. As I was saying, at the moment people can look at this NaFRA2 document. It is publicly available. They can put in their postcode and find out the exact flood risk for their property. That information is now available. It came out at the end of March. People can put it in and they can see what lev…”

“I definitely agree with you in that local people are not always clear about what they need to do. A few things came out from the lessons learned work we did through the taskforce from the flooding that we had over Christmas. One was local response arrangements and people. One acknowledged that the flood emergency respo…”

“The consultation—and, as I say, it is a consultation at the moment—is on looking to fully fund the first £3 million. Lots of smaller projects that are happening up and down the country, under the current system, have to find partnership funding. It is quite difficult to find partnership funding for smaller projects, es…”

“On planning for flooding?”