Dredging and drain clearance will limit floods – Yorkshire Post Letters

THERE’S been lots of talk in the news regarding Storm Darcy and the damage it has done to the local area, but does the blame solely lie on the weather and climate change?

Firstly, the storm has been overhyped. It’s rained for a few days, that’s all. It tends to happen in winter especially in Northern regions such as Yorkshire, and always has done.

What is actually needed is for local authorities and river and canal maintenance organisations to dredge watercourses and to clear the banks of trees and shrubs, including getting willow trees out of the channels. Watercourses must be maintained or they will block up.

The same goes for blocked drains. They will burst and overflow, causing flooding.

Maybe some common sense needs to be utilised here rather than sensationalising the weather conditions. Maybe the blame lies in an inability to prepare for such conditions?

To quote the well-known phrase: if you fail to prepare, then prepare to fail.

From: James Buick, Harrogate.

THANK you, Tom Richmond (The Yorkshire Post, February 6) for exposing George Eustice’s broken promises on flooding. I look forward to Defra’s response.

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