3. Statement by the Minister for Climate Change: Flooding

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:25 pm on 17 January 2023.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 3:25, 17 January 2023

I'm not too sure which budget you're referring to there, Carolyn, I'm afraid. So, there's a very specific flood management budget, and it's ring-fenced for flood management for NRW. Local authorities have it as part of the revenue support grant, but they are expected to put a programme in place. So, I'm happy to discuss the specifics with you there. But it's not a mix and match of budgets—it's a very specific budget. 

I just wanted to say—actually, in response to John Griffiths as well as to yourself—there is already in place in Wales the need to actually obtain planning consent to pave over your front garden. This is widely ignored, I have to say, and I'm planning to remind local authorities that that's the case. And I do think we need to have a programme of awareness and alertness for people to understand what happens if they make their front gardens impermeable. Joyce Watson has been talking about this for many years now, but I think it's becoming more and more obvious that people need to understand their own contribution to some of the things that are happening locally to them. If you stop your garden being able to absorb water, that water just pours straight into the gullies, taking with it anything that it's picked up along the way, and it causes the kind of blockages that you're talking about. So, I do think people need to be aware of that. If you want to park a car on your front garden and that's what it's for, there are many permeable surfaces that are perfectly appropriate for that, and allow some kind of biodiversity to thrive as well. It's not necessary to put a hard paving on it. 

But we are working very closely with our local authorities, Carolyn, to understand what the wider impact of the flooding and the extreme weather events that we've had will be. This, unfortunately, is not going to be an isolated incident. We know that last year was the warmest year on record. It's also rapidly becoming the wettest winter on record. So, I'm afraid this is a real measure of the times we live in, and we will have to find ways of becoming much more resilient, both in our relationships and in our response.