Flood Control: Finance
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to her Department's press release entitled Deprived communities to get new flood defences faster further to the announcement, published on 14 October 2025, how much funding her Department will allocate under the (a) new and (b) previous approach to (i) England (ii) the West Midlands and (iii) Worcestershire in 2025-26.
Answered by Emma Hardy
On 14 October, following consultation, the government announced major changes to its flood and coastal erosion funding policy. These changes will be used for the next flood programme starting in April 2026.
The new funding policy will optimise funding between building new flood projects and maintaining existing defences and will ensure that deprived communities continue to receive vital investment. We will use government funding to unlock investment from public, private and charitable sources, making every £1 of government investment go further. We will also invest at least £300 million in natural flood management over ten years – the highest figure to date for the floods programme.
The specific projects to receive funding in each year will continue to be decided through the Environment Agency's annual refresh process, which will be consented by Regional Flood and Coastal Committees.
For 25/26 our programme of investment was published here: Programme of flood and coastal erosion risk management (FCERM) schemes - GOV.UK.
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