Britain’s most flooded farmer stunned over grant rejection
A LINCOLNSHIRE man dubbed “Britain’s most flooded farmer” says he was stunned after learning he was not eligible for a Government flood recovery grant.
Henry Ward’s 200-acre farm in Shortferry, near Lincoln, has been underwater for nearly six months following the devastating floods at the back end of 2023.
The 33-year-old has only been able to access his home and farmyard by boat up until recently, and says he has lost in excess of £150,000 because of the flooding.
The Rural Payments Agency (RPA) sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra), announced a scheme on April 9 which can provide between £500 to £25,000 to farmers who have suffered uninsurable damage to their land after recent flooding.
However, Mr Ward was told he is not eligible to receive any money due to the river next to his farm, the Barlings Eau, not being on Defra’s list. Mr Ward planted winter wheat, grain, and vine peas in Autumn last year which have been destroyed. He will now have to go a full year without harvest, leaving him with no income.
Reacting to being told he wasn’t eligible for the grant, he said: “It’s a joke. I’m absolutely stunned and shocked. I never even envisaged that I wouldn’t be eligible. It’s the mother of all ironies given that I’m literally the country’s most famous flooded farmer. I was straight on the phone when they announced it to try and get an application going. The £25,000 isn’t a lot in the grand scheme of things but it will all help.
“They told me I wasn’t on the list and it’s all because the river that burst its banks on our farm isn’t listed by Defra as an eligible river to claim against. It’s just ludicrous. If I’m not eligible for the full £25,000 then who on earth is?
“It just goes to show the disconnect between civil servants in London who have come up with this scheme and what is actually happening on the ground. It’s just nonsensical.”
Mr Ward lost £35,000 to £40,000 overnight after his crops were destroyed and says he is now going to lose between £100,000 and £150,000 of revenue over the next year. On top of that, he is faced with the costs associated with repairing the damage.
It is not the first time his farm has flooded as a similar catastrophe occurred in 2019, the year he took over from his father.
The Environment Agency (EA) has mended the hole in the riverbank next to Mr Ward’s farm and is now pumping water away, but
Henry says there is a wider issue.
He said: “There is a mile of substandard riverbank adjacent to my farm and it will happen again this winter as soon as we get any serious rainfall.
“Going forward, that land is unfarmable and it’s just too risky to put in another crop. We need to be looking at putting the land into a flood storage scheme, letting it flood in a controlled way, so we’re not spending millions repairing the riverbank every few years.
“Then everyone will be better off because at the minute everyone is losing.”
Mr Ward has kept going financially by selling his shed full of crops from last year’s harvest but, in six to 12 months, he says he’ll struggle to keep going. He is hoping by then that he will have something set up with the EA where he can be compensated for the flooding.
He has even considered selling the land. Mr Ward said: “The EA are making the right noises but things like this don’t give me any confidence. I’ve offered my land to the EA already but they said no because at the minute they’re flooding it for free. I’d even sell it to someone like Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust, who I haven’t yet approached, because joking aside it would make an amazing nature reserve.”
Henry says the RPA told him they will be “looking at it to see what they can do”. In a post on X, Mr Ward joked about letting out his farmhouse which he said is located on its “own private island” and has views of “the sea”.
Defra says that to manage future flooding in this area, the EA is looking at the possibility of taking a different approach to help the area recover from flooding and the impacts of climate change. A Defra spokesperson said: “The Farming Recovery Fund has been opened to support farmers who have suffered uninsurable damage to their land this winter.
“We have activated the initial phase of the scheme to ensure grants begin to reach farmers as quickly as possible, and are now looking at how we can expand the scheme to further areas and improve the support for those worst affected.”