The following details have been supplied by the TUC:
Cuts to essential Environment Agency (EA) jobs will dramatically reduce the country’s ability to respond to floods and other extreme weather emergencies, unions have said.
The warning, coming as large stretches of the country remained flood affected, has received support from MPs. Conservative MP Anne McIntosh, chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Efra) Select Committee, this week warned: “Recent flooding events reinforce our concerns about cuts to the Defra budget. It is a small ministry facing massive cuts. Ministers must clarify how further budgets will impact on... the ability of the department to respond to emergencies.” She noted that EA, the frontline flood defence body funded by the environment department Defra, is set to lose 1,700 jobs by October, on top of 1,150 jobs lost since 2009: a total of 23 per cent of the workforce.
UNISON said the job cuts were “potentially catastrophic” in the wake of a series of devastating storms that have caused enormous damage to the UK's flood defences. UNISON national officer for EA, Matthew Lay, said: “Staff in the Agency have worked day and night to keep communities safe and prevent flood damage, and work tirelessly to support those devastated by the aftermath. The government can't have it both ways, praising the sterling work of members in the Agency but at the same time imposing further damaging cuts.”
Prospect deputy general secretary Leslie Manasseh said his members in EA management were being “forced to focus on how to make cuts, diverting them from their vital work providing flood warnings, repairing damage, maintaining flood defences and planning ahead for future crises of this nature.”
GMB national officer Justin Bowden said frontline staff would be affected, adding: “The public need to know that job losses on this scale will impact directly on flood risk management, on flood defence operations teams managing flood defences and carrying out river maintenance to enables flows to be conveyed away, enhancing the river's ecology and supporting fish stocks.”
