In recent months, the Save Capel Executive was represented at a series of online meetings with dozens of Flood Action Groups, hosted by the National Flood Forum (NFF), which included the development of a response to the proposed changes to the planning system in the Government’s ‘white paper’ – Planning for the future.
The response focusses on how the current planning system fails communities at risk of flooding, where local knowledge is largely ignored, and the Government’s proposals do nothing to address this. The proposals will reinforce the current inequalities, leading to even less democratic input. Peoples’ voices, their knowledge and evidence are absolutely central to creating safe places, at each and every stage of the planning system.
There is an opportunity to revise the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) to tackle climate change and its impacts, with a particular focus on the greatest ongoing threat in the UK, flooding. Managing flood risk from all sources to defined levels should be absolutely central to the NPPF, and its delivery in each local plan.
The Save Capel Executive has endorsed the report submitted by the NFF, which can be downloaded here.
The National Flood Forum is an independent charity established to help, support and represent individuals and communities at risk of flooding and has been doing this across the country since 2002. Around 300 Flood Action Groups are affiliated with the NFF. nationalfloodforum.org.uk
