Frustration over delay to Tadcaster flood defences

Businesses have been left counting the costs after Monday's flooding

Delays to an £11m flood defence scheme for a town hit by flooding after Storm Franklin are "incredibly frustrating," the town's MP has said.

Conservative Nigel Adams expressed concern after 70 properties in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, were flooded on Monday.

A scheme to protect the town was delayed for two years by the Environment Agency (EA) in 2021.

The EA said it was working as "quickly as possible" to progress the scheme.

Nigel Adams, the MP for Selby & Ainsty, said the latest flooding in the wake of recent storms had been devastating for his constituents.

"It is incredibly frustrating as the government allocated £11m back in 2019 for improved flood defences and, as yet, the scheme has not started," he told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

"It is high time for the EA to get its finger out and deliver the flood defences the town urgently needs."

The force of water destroyed steel fencing at the town's football ground

The EA said a review of the flood risk management scheme in Tadcaster had "highlighted inaccuracies in the complex modelling of the design".

"This has unfortunately delayed the start of construction, but we are working to progress the scheme as quickly as possible to better protect the community from flooding and extreme weather," a spokesperson said.

The scheme was proposed following the floods of 2015, when the town's 18th Century bridge collapsed.

• Town's flood-hit businesses begin clean-up

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For residents and business owners the wait for defences has been challenging.

"It's six-and-a-half years since Tadcaster Bridge collapsed, but there's no physical difference," said Tadcaster Albion FC chairman Andy Charlesworth.

"They must have done hundreds of flood schemes in the past and it's not rocket science."

Mick Malkinson's home was flooded in 2015, though he escaped this time he said he had been "frightened to death" as waters rose on Monday.

The 72-year-old said until the defence scheme was delivered residents would continue to live in a "state of anxiety".

Mick Malkinson said residents lived in a "state of anxiety" every time it rained

Local councillor Don Mackay said the EA had been "extremely slow" in delivering the scheme.

"In the meantime we've shops and houses flooded again, many of them are uninsured or their premiums will be enormous."

The town's mayor Steve Cobb agreed the agency seemed to have "dragged their heels".

"Who is going to move to Tadcaster to set up a business when every few years we flood as badly as we flooded on Monday?" he said.

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