Urgent need to dredge our rivers
From: Paul Muller, Woodthorpe Gardens, Sandal, Wakefield.
YOUR columnist Andrew Vine recently mentioned Sir Michael Pitt’s final remark in his 100-page report, published in 2008, that the problem of flooding was likely to become worse. How true his words were.
Every day we are shown pictures of water running down roads and streets into people’s houses, destroying their homes.
The rivers are the drainage systems of our land. When the soil cannot absorb any more water, it will run off the uplands. Every house and building in our land has a drainage system for sewerage. If there is a blockage or obstruction in the house, drains will overflow with disastrous results. The solution is to unblock the drain.
The solution to flooding in the country is exactly the same as the house drain solution, that is to unblock our rivers by dredging and so remove all the blockages to the smooth flow of water from the hills to the sea. Many years ago farmers did this job for us. It is impossible to slow the flow of water downhill – it is too heavy.
No more comprehensive new studies. No more procrastination. Just get on with it now and dredge the rivers from the hills to the sea. Stop building houses on flood plains or see how it can be done in Holland.
From: Peter Hyde, Driffield.
JOHN Wildie (The Yorkshire Post, February 22) has it right when he suggests that the HS2 budget should be diverted to flood defences. I have to agree with him that saving life and property is far more important than saving 20 minutes on a train journey from Birmingham to London.
From: Paul Brown, Sheffield.
THERE are two reasons for dredging rivers. First to remove stones and other debris in urban areas so as to promote free flow of water where there is a flooding risk to buildings.
Second to deepen the channel and recover material to create flood banks so as to use controlled areas of farmland as extra overflow areas.
Government departments appear reluctant to apply either course of action.
From: David Roberts, Almondbury, Huddersfield.
COUNCIL tax continues to rise above the rate of inflation while services continue to decline. Is it any wonder when council staff are on sick leave for months, no doubt on full pay (The Yorkshire Post, February 22), and then, on early retirement, are paid a sum the ordinary working man can only dream about?
Also in the same edition, the leader of the Labour-run Wakefield Council, which also proposes an above inflation council tax rise, states the council is “focusing on looking after its struggling residents”. There will be many more struggling if their council tax continues to rise.
Since the local councils were reorganised into metropolitan borough councilsm they have become bureaucratic monsters bleeding its citizens of their hard-earned money.
From: Oliver Sykes, Liverpool.
EVER since so-called ‘Brexit’ apparently happened at the end of last month, I have been excitedly waiting to see one of those streets paved with gold we were all promised.
So I was very excited the other day when I was going down the road and saw something shining brightly in the distance! Unfortunately it turned out to be just the winter sun reflecting off a puddle in a pothole. With vast areas of the country struggling with floods and creaky, leaky infrastructure, and the Prime Minister nowhere to be seen, could there be any better symbol of the illusions of ‘Brexit’?