To think that the Gvt should get its head out of the sand and declare a national emergency?

[Destinysdaughter]

I fortunately do not live in any of the areas affected by flooding but bloody hell, if this isn't now a national emergency I don't know what is? Just been watching it on the news and the complacency from our so called leaders is staggering! What's it gonna take? The Thames is now breaking its banks. Will it take the Houses of Parliament to be flooded before they take it seriously and help people...?

And anyone who says this isn't to do with climate change is off their rocket! (IMO)

When this kind pf thing happens why do people get a massive hard on for declaring a state of emergency and getting the troops out. It is almost as if the relish the idea of living in a dictatorship.

Someone said something about making hydro electric use of this problem.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold%E2%80%93silver%E2%80%93bronze_command_structure

This RJ I presume.

Ah yes, the south of England has a problem therefore it is a national emergency. Fuck off.

I don't think this is a national emergency. Too few people are affected.

Anyone know how many people affected? I havent heard any numbers quoted at all.

Exactly sayxa. Nationally, it isn't a problem. It's localised.

A basic overview of the contingencies act.

There are 2 types of responder
Cat 1 - blue lights, environment agency local authority, nhs
Cat 2 - utility providers, telecom providers, local transport providers

They have a duty to work together, risk assess and plan the response to major incidents.

They do this.

The response to an incident is usually tiered into gold/silver/bronze.

Gold (police chief, fire chief, CEO level) - they take a strategic overall view of the incident. Usually led by the police.

Silver (managing the incident) sometimes on the ground, sometimes not

Bronze - the doers actually fixing and doing.

The response is usually multi agency - everyone working together.

The army can be utilised in these events, and the will have a liaison role into one or more of the response levels.

The second part is about emergency powers and gives the Secretary of State the ability to enact emergency laws for 7days.

I would like to assured that flooding victims are receiving the following:

decent level of coordinated communication from relevant agencies
a place of refuge
their vacated property protected from looters
for those staying in their homes, drinking water portage, adequate transport/communication, safe sewerage arrangements,
I would like to know the plans in place for the clean up, repairs to infrastructure, a budget allocated for this.
also the strategy for releasing water down the Thames through the barrier.
strategy in place for dealing with future flooding, if you're not going to dredge what will happen instead.
I'm going to add enacting flood mutual, but as that's up in the air at the moment government and insurance brokers will have to agree.

I loving all the "something must be done" but not a single idea of what something is.

Lots of things that could/should be done to stop it happening again but imo much of that involves sacrificing some land/properties which i don't suppose will be universally popular. i can't think of anything much more that can be done now.

If you're flooded you can't flush the loo, have a shower, or anything. You will most likely have no power. It's awful, really awful . Perhaps the MPs should offer their second homes to these poor people.

it does have the ring of dads army

must be bloody depressing to be flooded though.

Hopefully if they build new houses in these area, they can adapt them to handle flooding.

Like flats with downstairs garages, High electrics. Build houses designed for floods.

I second RJ - I bet everyone locally is working their arse off, but its not a national emergency .

Government should just focus on allocating the budget and getting flood mutual and long term solutions in motion.

It's been intriguing to see the Environment Agency flood team round our way in East Anglia - they've been (as far as I can see) tackling streams and drainage ditches before they overflow onto roads, to keep them draining properly. We've just seen various drainage ditches dug out, others cleared, and chaps going at things with forks on the river side. But it seems to be quite reliant on having a chance to get at blockages and so on before the water actually overflows.

I absolutely agree that housing policy and planning laws have a lot to answer for. Eric pickles rides roughshod over local planners to allow big developers the ability to build on more flood plains, these events will unfortunately be more common place.

There is a bit you can do yourself and to anyone looking at flood proofing your home the flood forum has some great advice, plus they are lovely people.

nationalfloodforum.org.uk

But we've got to build anywhere as it's good for the economy. And we don't care about environmental consequences as long as we get cheap energy.

Hopefully the Government might change their view now Conservative voters have been affected.

it's not a national emergency but the L.A.s / whoever need to help residents better - there was a guy on the news panicking as he had no idea where to go to the toilet, it all just flooded into his garden

he was begging for a chemical toilet somewhere easy to get to for old folks and kids, stuff like this could've been better sorted, but agree also we don't know what's happening hour by hour,

Isn't that why we have councils? To have some kind of local plan in case of emergencies like flooding?

Or have funding cuts affected this?

Er... Do you mean you want days off work coz it's national emergency flooding...?

Most of the country isn't flooded. It's just wet. Happens in Bangladesh every year and no one gives a shit.

(My geography is poor, India def, unsure of Bangladesh now I think about it it specifically but you get my gist.)

Very much so Holly. My local council doesn't have an out of hours emergency contact. Which as you can imagine was rather shit for people over Christmas.

Yes it's not nice but definitely not a national emergency. When speaking to my nurse today she was saying less homes are affected than when there a flash flood in the Midlands last summer and people had raw sewage in their homes. A lot of these people are still out of their homes many months later, yet I doubt this story made the national news, or if it did it would have been for a day!

It's like the snow. We aren't used to it - if you live in a country that floods or gets heavy snow, you adapt.

Hopefully we'll learn to adapt and have plans in place. Like toilets.

It's not a national emergency. It's affecting a part of the country. Lovely sunshine here. Once again, something that happens in the south is considered 'a national problem' as if the rest of us don't exist.