Flood sirens (Norfolk County Council Liberal Democrats)

Norfolk County Council Liberal Democrats <info@norfolkcclibdems.org.uk>

Our campaign to save the flood sirens

The issue

In 1992 the Home Office closed down the National Siren Civil Defence Warning System and ceased all funding for sirens. Maritime Counties were offered the sirens, free of charge, to continue using them as part of the local flood warning system, with no costs for maintaining or operating the retained sirens being met by Central Government. Norfolk, Essex and Lincolnshire decided to retain the sirens and use them in connection with the coastal flood warning / response strategy.

In the last few years the Environment Agency has developed a flood warning system (Floodline Warning Direct), which provides advance warning of possible floods, by using three levels of alerts to people via their phone, mobile or pager. As a result partly of this development and also the view shared by some that the Norfolk flood sirens were getting too out-dated and expensive to maintain, local agencies recommended that Norfolk should no longer retain flood sirens as part of the flood warning arrangements with effect from July 2007.

The public reacted very badly to the recommendation to remove the flood sirens and after some heavy campaigning Norfolk County Council decided to retain the sirens. However, it soon appeared that Norfolk Police, who have the legal responsibility for evacuating people when major flooding incidents occur would not agree to use the sirens even if the Council replaced them with better equipment. Similarly, the Environment Agency, which holds the responsibility nationally for flood warning, refuses to use the flood sirens, even though there appears to be strong support for them from local people.

The County Council is now at a loss about what to do with the flood sirens. They are costing valuable public resources and with no likelihood of them ever being used the Council has been forced to consider whether it can continue to pay for the sirens to be retained. They problem had been handed over to local MPs to see if they could exert any greater influence with the outside agencies and the prolem has attracted much national media interest.

Our view

We have been campaigning to save the flood sirens since we first became aware of this issue and have repeatedly challenged the recommendation to remove them. In fact, we believe there is an argument for replacing many of the failing sirens with newer, more reliable models.

We remain convinced that the sirens still have an important role to play in ensuring the protection of coastal communities. We are concerned that the Floodline system may still miss a number of residents, particularly the vulnerable who have more difficulties accessing and using modern technology.

Above all in this issue we are dismayed with the way in which other public service providers are able to make decisions which clearly run counter to the wishes of local residents.

What we are doing about it

As a result of work with colleagues at Norfolk County Council and with local flood wardens we have seen more consultation carried out with local people and have managed to secure a delay in a final decision being taken about the future of the sirens.

Since the issue first appeared we have been fully involved in work to identify how sirens could best serve local communities and have submitted many formal questions and motions to challenge decisions that were being taken against local residents' wishes.

We are currently awaiting a decision form the County Council as to the future of the flood sirens and will then consider how to take our campaign forward.