Time to fight for flood barrier -

not for brownie points

We sincerely hope that Friday’s visit to Boston by Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman was used as more than just an opportunity retrospectively to praise the recent Boston 200 flood exhibition and its creator, borough council and BBI leader Richard Austin.
But that’s certainly the impression we got from reading the report on the borough council’s website, where Councillor Austin received no fewer than five name checks and appeared in three of the four photographs, while Boston 200 received four mentions.
We were even told that Councillor Austin “accompanied” Ms Spelman “along with borough councillor and chairman of Lincolnshire County Council Peter Bedford” which sounds like an error in protocol to us, especially as Boston’s MP Mark Simmonds - at whose invitation Ms Spelman had come to Boston - was not only there, but went on to chair a meeting attended Ms Spelman, Lincolnshire County Council, Boston Borough Council, Anglian Water, the Environment Agency and the Internal Drainage Boards.
Agreed, the borough report mentions that Ms Spelman “heard and saw why the planned Boston Barrier scheme is so important.”
But we hope that more than just that was done in light of the news that the £50 million scheme could founder as a result of cuts.
Whilst the environment department has said funding over the next four years will be "just 8% less than our average yearly spend," Lord Smith, the chairman of the Environment Agency, recently told the Observer newspaper that flood defence spending will be "cut in cash terms by about 27% and that will happen immediately".
Worse still, he went on to add that: "There will be communities that would – if funding had remained in place as at present – be starting flood defence work in a year or two years' time that will now be delayed."
A line like that points the finger firmly at Boston’s barrier scheme.
The last time the Environment Agency staged one of its drop-in sessions to show the short listed sites for the proposed barrier in September, Boston Eye went along and asked specifically whether the scheme was under threat from proposed government cuts.
We were assured that this was categorically not the case.
But now, it seems, all that could change.
The need for a barrier was identified in 2007, with the construction timetable in three parts - an initial appraisal between 2009 and 2013, detailed design work from 2013 to 2015, and the construction phase taking two years, from 2015 to 2017.
Interestingly 2015 marks the end of the coalition parliament – which makes it even more convenient to kick Boston’s barrier into touch and leave it to a successor government to find the money.
Existing flood defences give Boston with a standard of protection equivalent to a one in 50 chance of flooding from a tidal surge in any year, and around 900 businesses and 10,000 homes are currently at risk from a tidal sugre.
The Boston Barrier would increase the standard of protection to a one in 300 chance, which would force the insurance underwriters to reconsider the area’s risk assessment, and bring affordable cover to many who current are either denied it or have to forego it.
We think that Boston 200 has had its day.
All it has served to do is highlight how dangerous and unattractive the area is as a place to live and invest.
All efforts now should be directed at getting the Boston Barrier built, not using it as a pawn in some political game to promote an indifferent exhibition of little interest that is now long past.
Note: Councillor Austin’s role in Friday’s meeting is even more gravely misstated on the website of the Association of Drainage Authorities – which publishes under the twee acronym “ada” and which goes on to report “the visit was organised by Cllr. Richard Austin, Leader of Boston Borough Council.” – see our photo below.

click on the picture above to enlarge it

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