Flooding on farmland sparks agency clash

But an EA engineer hit back this week at complaints from alongside the Idle, which runs from North Notts into South Yorkshire at Bawtry and then through flat land into the Trent.

Dairy farmer John Dickinson, of Scaftworth, lost grass and crops to prolonged flooding in 2007, narrowly escaped similar problems in 2008 and had land under water again for most of the second half of January.

The water started going down suddenly after 11 days, and he thought the Environment Agency had finally switched on the pumps which are supposed to help the Idle into the Trent. But the EA swears it had been pumping flat-out since January 16, when heavy rain started adding to snow melt.

If that was true, according to local farmers, the lack of result proved their point that the river needs more dredging and vegetation clearance.

Two miles downstream, near Misson, arable farmer Nick Huddlestone lost 280 acres of wheat to floodwater in 2007 and this week was losing hope of saving another 80 acres, which had been underwater since mid January, because gates into the river from a drain on his land were not working.

He is not allowed to touch them and the EA, which has responsibility for the river, and the Idle and Ryton Drainage Board, which charges him to run the dyke, could not agree what the problem was or who was responsible, he said.

Stan White of Misterton Carr, a farmer who sits on the drainage board, said the EA was too big and the 700 drainage boards were too small and there was a need for amalgamated bodies of middle size – which Defra is moving towards, after years of discussion.

Martin Wiles, full-time official of the Selby NFU group, which covers the Doncaster area, said: "The EA needs to be on the ground more, with the landowners and the drainage agencies, looking at the situations together and resolving them together."

But Innes Thomson, flood risk manager for the EA for the area covering the Idle, said: "Whatever selective memory says, dredging would not help move water down that river. As for vegetation clearance, we do it differently nowadays but we do extensive work on it.

"A lot of this land has always been in the flood plain but we had 10 fairly dry years up to 2004. Also, in that area, subsidence from mining activity may well be a factor.

"I do not accept that the Environment Agency has made lives worse alongside the Idle."