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  • the water rose early in the morning to leave parks and streets part hidden by flooding around the center of Hereford.

  • Yet another case study in the story of the unrelenting February storms, I hear they're having to take a paramedic by boat into a stranded neighborhood.

  • They know all about flooding here, but rarely on this scale.

  • So what we doing now is we're sending folks like to go and rescue people, which we've done since first thing this morning.

  • We've made approximately 20 to 25 rescue so far.

  • How many of the residents have Bean moved out?

  • There's a lot of people that have been moved out is not not very many people left, really.

  • They've been brilliant.

  • Emergency service is up and down constantly all day.

  • Really, really good.

  • Can't can't thank these people enough.

  • And so in the increasingly familiar flood induced choreography, more churches and leisure centres air turned into temporary shelters, the Environment Agency said in places the river why had reached its highest level since records began 200 years ago.

  • The worst of the embassy.

  • There was a job in here and I've been lonely ran this place for three donkeys in Worcestershire Police searching for a 55 year old woman missing after being swept into flood water by the river team said this evening they found a body By mid morning, more than 500 flood alerts and warnings covered much of England following a record number The day before, this was the scene in Guilford in Sorry and with more flooding came or criticism of the UK government response today, the environment minister said they were committing billions of pounds to flood defences, the flood infrastructure that we have in place.

  • The flood defense infrastructure has worked as expected and has protected around 20,000 homes in this particular incident.

  • I know that's no comfort.

  • It'll of sea to the 400 homes that have been flooded.

  • So the emergency operations are continuing this evening in Hereford.

  • But in other parts of the UK, which bore the brunt of the weekend storms, it's the aftermath there now having to deal with, particularly in South Wales.

  • We found business after business immersed in the wreckage of the weekend.

  • The damage here, Phil Thomas shows us his microbrewery still spewing flood.

  • This image from the police helicopter shows the scale of the flooding they encountered on just this one industrial estate.

  • Okay, man walked in through the door with my wife and two kids, and I wasn't.

  • I was in tears.

  • You know, I've been here for five years, building up the brisk business slowly but surely, And, you know, in one evening this £10,000 with damage, or the first minister of Wales a few miles away.

  • In Ponta Preys knows there's also major infrastructure damage beyond the chaos at street level, where for some residents it's still a struggle to access that properties.

  • It's just not shift in it.

  • And those who have a left in despair.

  • Obviously it's come up to the six foot on the wall, absolutely devastated.

  • Kerry Loveridge woke up on the sofa, surrounded by water.

  • Like others, she feels warnings could have been clearer.

  • Get it devastated on dhe, all cried out.

  • I am angry, very angry.

  • As you can see, I am little.

  • We are literally gonna be out to this house for it's gonna be about six months, if not longer.

  • And now here it supplied come Marie, accusing a Labour government of underinvestment in flood defences.

  • Some are asking questions about whether your government has got a grip on this issue.

  • Well, no government could have predicted what happened here over the weekend.

  • This government will spend £350 million in this assembly term alone on flood defenses in Wales.

  • Back in Hereford, the flood levels and now slowly receding but a neighboring was to share the threat of rising water remains.

  • As we enter yet another night of people being told to leave their homes well.

  • Gray Friar's Avenue here is usually a pretty pleasant place to live just yards from the town centre and not far from the river.

  • Why?

  • But with that river at its highest level in 200 years, people living here on a floodplain have had to leave, grabbing what they can of their belongings.

  • I spent the afternoon with one family Ferried back to check on their home by their neighbor and volunteer flood warden.

  • This quiet, little colder sack in Hereford is today a backwater in all senses of the word storm.

  • Dennis took the river.

  • Why, at the bottom of the street to record high levels and householders like teaching assistant Lydia Williams have been forced from their homes.

  • For me, it was just so overwhelming.

  • Since the last time my house didn't get flooded, it just missed out on it.

  • But as soon as me and my mom saw it coming in and went back to sleep, and then we woke up to all our downstairs underwater just so shocked neighbor and volunteer flood warden Colin Taylor is steering has passed the floating Detroiters to the house where Lydia's lived with her parents for six years.

  • He's never seen anything like this was the biggest.

  • It was worse than this.

  • No, no, no.

  • That was the biggest fall on our second biggest always brought on record.

  • This is great.

  • This while we're over for the water.

  • Lydia's mom didn't want to make the journey back because she was too upset to see the damage flooding has done to the home.

  • They lovingly renovated a new kitchen completed just four months ago, that crushed over in the middle of the night that it was this morning, Um, that toppled over inside floated so you can still have certainty that is, in the dining room.

  • There's Maur devastation, a sodden mess of photo albums.

  • The memories within in danger of being washed clean away, you can see or your family belongings will just vanish.

  • And something like photos, stables Precious to you.

  • It's very aim a while overwhelming.

  • And Justin was a shock.

  • Yeah, that's really, really emotional.

  • Back on dry land, we meet Lydia's mom, Lindsay.

  • So we just went back with Lydia tellers.

  • Why you didn't want to come?

  • Well, it's the first time it's ever flooded, and it's the first time I've been in this situation.

  • So I just thought if I went back now, it would probably really upset me because it's, you know, it's still a bit of a shock to think that I'm not going home tonight to sit.

  • Oh, my sofa.

  • This street was built on a flood plain in the 19 thirties, when Lydia's family bought it.

  • They knew it was a risk, but until last night it had never flooded so badly.

  • It'll be months before they can return their home to some semblance of normality.

  • Now they're wondering if this is the new normal.

  • Well, joining me now is Mark Garnier, the MP for wire for it, a neighboring constituency which has flooded in the past on the Reverend Wreath.

  • Hulse.

  • Who's the church?

  • England's dean for the Hereford area?

  • Ghani First River.

  • Why here is at its highest level since records began.

  • Clearly unprecedented.

  • What do you want the government to do?

  • More than it's already doing to protect people here and in your constituency?

  • Well, good news is in my constituency, actually going back as far as Tony Blair's government, they brought in some demand.

  • Herbal flood barriers in beautifully on that type of approach is incredibly good.

  • One of the important things I think we are promising is an extra £4 billion spent over the next five years on what I think we want to defend on flood defences.

  • Nothing.

  • What we want to see is more of this type of the mandible flood defences.

  • It could come in, but where you can't do the amount herbal flood defences.

  • You wanna have property level defenses, so there's lots of different ways you can approach it.

  • And I think taking a sort of cohesive approach to this is the way forward.

  • Would you like the prime minister to visit here with that help?

  • Actually, I don't think it would.

  • What I really want is George Eustice to carry on, do the job.

  • He's doing his environment.

  • Sexual Rebecca Power in my patch yesterday.

  • Who's the floods minister?

  • So she came up to see what was going on.

  • It's great having the prime minister, and it looks good on telly.

  • But do you know what I'd rather he kept out of the way while while the Environment Agency did their star liability?

  • But should he convene Cobra, though, given how many people are being forced out of their homes?

  • This is an extraordinary situation.

  • I don't know whether you should convene.

  • Convene Cobra or not, I'm a minister.

  • Saturn Couple of Cobra Meeting's over things which was substantially bigger than this Look, maybe better.

  • How you deliver stuff is not about how you hold a meeting.

  • It's actually what you do on the ground in the Environment Agency I would keep repeating is doing a fantastic job as by the way, is Jesse Norman is a local MP here.

  • Environment Secretary said that the government couldn't protect everybody with standing here on a floodplain.

  • Is it tight at large that parts of this constituency parts of your constituency will in future be uninhabitable?

  • I wouldn't say as far as uninhabitable.

  • But I think one of the things we need to look at, Matt, you're looking at these houses.

  • I mean, the first thing I say is how unbelievably disruptive and a waffle it is for the people live there.

  • But at some point, they're gonna have to restore repair their houses.

  • Maybe we do need to start thinking about when you put the house back into working order.

  • Actually, you did, in a way where the ground floor can be cleaned up relatively easy.

  • So you don't have carpet.

  • You don't have cell phones on the ground floor.

  • Maybe we need to just change the way we live in in order to adapt to these types of climate changes.

  • Let me bring in the Reverend Reede house.

  • Now, we've just touched there on the set of human suffering.

  • This is causing.

  • I saw this afternoon as well.

  • What you grabbing from your parishioners about how they're coping with this?

  • I've been astounded by the community spirit that's come out, actually, that neighbors are looking after neighbors on all the different agencies are working together.

  • So I've been in contact with local councillors and fire and rescue teams on, as I said, neighbors and residents and churches, and they're all working together to try and provide a safety on warm, dry places for these people who have had a horrendous experiences with these floods.

  • Second time in a matter of months.

  • Andi, it's been great to see the community spirit under such awful circumstances.

  • Do you think you're getting enough help from the government here from the authorities?

  • More broadly, it's a very difficult question, that is, and I think they local council have done quite a lot for flood defences on.

  • They've certainly bean out, and we've seen all the fire and rescue teams are doing their very best.

  • I think it's really difficult to know what else they could do, how much more they could invest in here.

  • Be great that this didn't have to happen again, s so it's certainly if there was a way that that could happen, more money, more investment would be great.

  • Would you like that?

  • I think I would have to agree that actually had the presence would look great, but actually doing something would be far greater and far more significant.

  • Hair charge.

  • William was being pretty outspoken on climate change recently, setting a target for net zero emissions of 2030 which is well before the government.

  • Why is the church taking the lead on this?

  • I think I think we have Thio.

  • I think the church has something to say about creation on dhe, about caring for for the planet and the surroundings and for people as well.

  • And so we have to make a stand, and it's all very well just talking about it.

  • But you've actually got to do something, haven't you?

  • And so that's That's why they've set this this target.

  • And so we've seen ICO churches popping up all over the place to try and do something to say.

  • Actually, this is an important issue for everybody on for us on.

  • We need to start acting now.

  • What?

  • ICO Churches Churches are churches that are trying to reduce their carbon footprint so they try and use Maur reusable and recyclable things, solar panels, all those steps that are out there already.

  • But we're trying to bring them together just to try and save.

  • This is an important issue to us.

  • Would you like the government to be more ambitious on its carbon emissions targets.

  • Oh, yes, yeah.

  • Well, let me put up to the mark Garnier, using the governor's got a really step up now on climate change.

  • Take this much I've taken recently to meeting with a group of clover change activists in my constituency.

  • And actually it's fascinating talking to people who really, really feel passionate about this.

  • I said anything?

  • We need to turn a lot more time listening.

  • Listen to them.

  • I think they're a huge amount of climate changes that have happened confronting us.

  • We need to tackle this head on.

  • But is that the sense of urgency in the government?

  • I think the way we're moving back on things like electric cars.

  • It was originally 2040 than it was 2020 32.

  • There is there is a genuine change and also bear in mind that it was a conservative government that introduced, you know, the kind of the subsidy for non leaded unleaded petrol.

  • It was one of my predecessors who brought in the Clean Air Act in 1956.

  • There has been quite a lot going on from a from conservative governments.

  • One where the other bullet, I didn't actually saying 2030 target governments is 2050 is that it may have to, I mean, I think, but I think we need to bring all of the population with us.

  • There's an awful lot of people who are very, very committed to this, like, really, really sympathetic with their views.

  • But not everybody is, and I think it's a It's a process of the government needs to encourage more, more people to feel passionately about this, and that's the way the government can get these things done faster.

  • It's everybody working together.

  • Marconi Revenue fell calls.

  • Thank you very much for joining us in your Wellies out here.

  • Thank you.

  • Well, other areas across the country have been feeling the effects off.

  • Storm dentist.

  • The army was brought into parts of Yorkshire over the weekend to help with flood defences.

  • Another whole.

  • Those measures seem to have worked in York today, with the river is rising, it was feared there might be flooding.

  • But it's a city with significant defenses and well used to coping are north of England.

  • Correspondent Claire Fallon is there for us now, Claire.

  • Right now, it is not easy to tell what is normally the river who's on what is normally solid land.

  • But at the bottom of this slope, Eric and the water's got to be about six foot deep.

  • Of course, most of York is not underwater, and they are pretty used to dealing with flooding here.

  • That constants washing noise that you can probably hear is the water being pumped out from the pope down there.

  • And it's something that they've done time and time again over the years.

  • And once the water level drops, the reality is, in a few days they'll be open and serving pints again.

  • But not everywhere have had the investment in flood defenses that they've had here go back to the wide spread flooding across much of the North at the back end of last year.

  • And then the prime minister said it was not a national crisis.

  • So where is this now?

  • A national crisis after the second big storm and as many weeks with hundreds of homes having been flooded?

  • That's where I asked Craig McGarvey from the Environment Agency when I spoke to him earlier today.

  • Right now we're dealing with it's fluid situation on this is a better situation was last weekend, the national issue is how we deal with climate change in the future and make sure that we are looking at innovative solutions to manage increasingly stormy weather.

  • So let me put this a different way.

  • Should there be a cobra meeting to deal with what we're facing at the moment, we're making sure that well briefed, we've been briefing the secretary of state.

  • The secretary has bean up to Yorkshire this weekend to look out the issues and well briefed Prime minister hasn't been to anywhere affected by flooding.

  • The house on our job just to make sure that we are briefing government were briefing them well on government, providing us with support in terms of investment.

  • They're investing £2.6 billion between 2015 2021 to better protect 300,000 homes.

  • Isn't there a reality that where you build big barriers to try and protect some homes, water simply comes out somewhere else and floods other homes.

  • When we build flood defences, we make sure that we don't cause flooding elsewhere.

  • And if it is going to cause problems to actually build defensive, protect those places, but we make sure we don't cause more flooding elsewhere.

  • As we deal with this climate emergency, we are gonna have to look at some tough choices.

  • Way can build the flood defences.

  • We can't keep building bigger and bigger flip defense across the whole country.

  • We need to look at slowing the flow of the water in rivers and in some places we might have to look at not being able to defend communities and either designed the houses so that could be flooded, cleared out quickly and get back to normal.

  • Or it might not be possible to protect all of those communities in the future.

  • So you save someone sacrifice of us?

  • No, I think it's just as we deal with climate emergency, we're gonna have to have a different offer choices and conversations about what we can and can't protect.

  • It just might not be possible in every place across the country to protect every heart.

  • So what would you say today to people in Hereford who are waist deep in water to people in my van Roy who only a few days ago were flooded yet again because the defenses there haven't been completed yet?

  • Well, first of all, you know our hearts go out to every family.

  • Every business has been flooded.

  • It's a terrible situation to do with.

  • We will keep investing in flood defenses there to try and reduce the flooding.

  • But I emphasize we are reducing the risk.

  • We can't take the risk away completely.

the water rose early in the morning to leave parks and streets part hidden by flooding around the center of Hereford.

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