Alicia Kearns

The hon. Gentleman is at risk of stealing my sandwiches, but I will get there shortly. He is right, particularly when it comes to farmers; too often they are overlooked and they need support. The issues that I hear about at my flooding summits are that local authorities are too often silent when asked for help, and that riparian owners are not taking their duties as seriously as they should—dredging goes undone and drains go uncleared—and when people from Rutland ask the Government for support, we are told that we do not qualify. The reason for that is a simple number: 50. To access the flooding recovery framework, 50 houses must flood. Below that line, there is no support; above that line, here comes the cavalry. For Leicestershire and Lincolnshire, which I also serve, 50 flooded houses is sadly an achievable and often exceeded threshold, but because Rutland is the smallest county—we have just 41,000 residents—we almost never hit 50 flooded homes, thankfully. We must remember the 30 houses that were badly damaged in Greatford in Lincolnshire, which I serve. If it had been the only village in Lincolnshire to flood, it would have had no support, despite people having to be evacuated by boat and being besieged. There is something deeply wrong with a framework so rigid that those in need of help do not or might not receive support. I raised this objection in the last Parliament, and my Government then listened. The Conservative Government made sure that in 2024, for the first time ever, Rutland could access the flood recovery grant. I ask the Government to make those changes permanent ahead of the next big floods this year. Surely support should be based on the percentage of the population affected or just those who are the most affected, and accessing this funding would make an enormous difference. I also ask the Minister to ensure that she provides support for farmers. In the village of Tixover in my community, for example, farmers have had to spend up to £80,000 this year buying food for their sheep, which would otherwise just graze off the grass, because they cannot access their land because it is so flooded. We talk about flood risk in terms of physical damage, infrastructure and recovery time, but there is a financial dimension to this issue that is devastating households. That is the insurance market. For families in flood-risk areas, insurance premiums are eye-watering where they are available at all, so families have to cover the risk themselves; they hope that this year, the storm will pass, the river will hold or the drain will cope, but it never quite does. A family living in fear of flooding is living in fear, not just of water, but of the bill that comes in the post. Flood Re was a vital reinsurance scheme established by the last Government, but homes built since 2009 are not covered, and that scheme’s remit will end in 2030, leaving people stuck. I would be grateful if the Minister could give us an update on the Government’s thinking on this matter.