Warning of more properties at risk from deluge as agencies continue the clean-up

OVER 60,000 properties are at significant risk of flooding in Northern Ireland, with nothing being done to deal with the problem, it has been warned.

Questions have also been raised about how local agencies responded to the devastation earlier this week and the time it took for help to arrive to many people affected by the deluge.

It comes as flood-hit areas brace themselves for more heavy rain after a yellow weather warning was issued by the Met Office, predicting localised flooding of homes and businesses as well as susceptible roads.

Ulster Unionist MLA John Stewart said that in the absence of the Executive no preparations are being taken to deal with flooding, which is “an ever more common occurrence”.

“It is widely accepted that Northern Ireland’s drainage infrastructure is insufficient to meet the future requirements expected of it,” he said.

Mr Stewart cited official flood maps drawn up by the Rivers Agency, which he said show up to 46,000 of our 830,000 properties could be at significant risk of flooding due to their location in coastal or river flood plains.

A further 20,000 properties are sited in an area at risk of flooding from a significant rainfall event, he added. “A previous Executive report five years ago recommended the consolidation of all of the flood response agencies under one Department, yet this only happened last year,” Mr Stewart continued.

“The combined flood response is still not good enough, however — there was total confusion earlier in the week as to which department was even responsible for authorising the £1,000 emergency flood payments.

“It would have been outrageous if homeowners affected by these floods were left further out of pocket as a result of the political limbo at Stormont.”

The Department for Infrastructure said agencies including the police, fire service, Northern Ireland Water, rivers, roads and local government teams were continuing to work on the cleanup operation.

It added that more than 8,000 sandbags had been given out since Tuesday and stocks were being replenished in locations where there is an imminent risk to life or risk of significant damage to property from flooding.

BT Northern Ireland said this week’s storms led to over 3,000 reports of faults on its network, the highest it has ever received.

“We have diverted all resources into repairing this unprecedented volume of faults for our customers, and our engineer and service teams are working 24/7 on this major recovery programme,” said a spokeswoman.

“We are facing some very challenging conditions, however, and would like to assure our impacted customers that we are doing everything we possibly can to bring them back into service as soon as possible.”

Meanwhile, the north west is braced for the possibility of more flooding as a “yellow” weather warning remains in place for “heavy and slow moving” rain.