New calls for flood defences

3:41pm Wednesday 6th August 2008

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Flood-hit homeowners have reacted angrily to news Abingdon will not get any new defences to protect against future deluges.

Last week the Environment Agency (EA) admitted its preferred options for preventing a repeat of last July's floods did not meet national funding criteria.

The announcement has been met with public outcry from residents who want more to be done.

Last year 433 homes and 21 businesses by the town's River Ock flooded.

More than a year on, 43 families have still not returned to their homes.

Comments have been posted on the websites of the Oxford Mail and our sister paper the Abingdon Herald from people angry about the lack of funding.

Neil Fawcett, of Abingdon, said: "We were flooded and out of our house for nearly a year.

"They are still finishing off the work on the house. We only got running water back in the kitchen yesterday.

"If it is the case that there is not enough funding for Abingdon, it is simply a demonstration that the Government is not putting nearly enough in overall."

The EA had proposed building walls and embankments along the River Ock, creating flood storage areas upstream of the town and knocking down the disused St Helen's Mill Bridge.

The agency's preferred options would cost between £3m and £3.5m. But it said it would not apply for funding from the Government as it knows it will be refused.

Paul Haggen, spokesman for the Department for Environment and Rural Affairs, insisted the Government was not to blame.

He said: "There is only a certain amount of money to go around."

Linda Joel, of Tower Close, was flooded out of her home for 10 months.

She said: "It's absolutely appalling.

"What happens if we are flooded again? We need defences now."

Abingdon MP Evan Harris said: "It's not acceptable for schemes that would protect Abingdon to be judged to be not cost-effective simply because they don't meet a threshold, because that threshold is itself set from inadequate central funding."