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Caerphilly Council welcomes commitment to invest in Wales’ future flood risk

Posted on : 04 May 2023

Caerphilly County Borough Council has welcomed additional funding from Welsh Government to help deliver a number of flood alleviation schemes.

The Council has successfully submitted applications to Welsh Government for 24 schemes, which has seen them awarded over £800,000 this financial year. Additional funding is being provided from the Council’s capital budget, bringing the total investment to around £1 million. This will be used to mitigate flooding and to develop a local network of monitoring and warning services.

Minister for Climate Change, Julie James MS, recently announced a record £75 million of funding from Welsh Government for flood defences. A significant proportion of the funding will be provided to Natural Resources Wales to support their core programme of works on larger main rivers, over £10 million is being provided to local authorities to progress with larger capital flood alleviation schemes and £3.7 million for small scale schemes to address localised flooding from surface water, groundwater and smaller watercourses.

The Minister also announced a continuing commitment to long term investment in flood risk management through a total revenue investment of £5 million to enable local authorities to manage and maintain existing flood risk infrastructure.

Cllr Julian Simmonds, Caerphilly Council’s Cabinet Member for Highways & Transportation said “In 2019 the Council declared a climate emergency and predictions suggest that we’re likely to see more frequent and more intense storms. Managing this risk comes with a number of technical challenges in Caerphilly as the steep valleys mean that water levels in streams and rivers change very quickly in response to localised rainfall.

“We welcome the funding announcement from Welsh Government, which will enable us to invest in monitoring and warning systems to help track and respond to changing conditions. We’re also investigating ways to help slow the flow of water across the landscape and higher up in catchments; reducing the risk of flooding.”

The full list and a map of schemes is available at Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Programme 2023 to 2024 | GOV.WALES.

The Council will be consulting on an update to its Local Flood Risk Management Strategy and Plan over the coming months, allowing residents and businesses to help improve management of flood risk in the future.

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