SEFTON’S changing coastline is to benefit from a £337,000 government boost.

The Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has pledged the money to help Sefton Council adapt to coastal erosion and dune movements at Formby.

The site was last year highlighted by a National Trust report which named it among the top 10 UK beaches which could be irrevocably changed by increasingly stormy weather.

With one of the largest dune systems in Britain, Sefton Council proposed building a new board walk system at the site to continue access to the sands. (more…)

A successful multi million pound bid to solve major coastal problems in Norfolk and Suffolk was hailed by experts and campaigners last night as the most important step ever taken in the management of the coast.

And as three local authorities – North Norfolk, Waveney and Great Yarmouth – celebrated winning nearly £5m out of a national pot of £11m to address a range of challenges, officials in charge of managing the coast said the money would help individuals about to lose their homes to erosion, the two counties as a whole and also build future policies for the rest of the country in the face of climate change.

A small number of people teetering on the very edges of some cliff tops, including in the now internationally known erosion hotspot of Happisburgh, were for the first time guaranteed payments for the loss of their homes where they had previously faced walking away with nothing. (more…)

15 coastal change pathfinder authorities who will explore new ways of adapting to coastal change have been announced on the Defra website. These include Scarborough Borough Council, East Riding District Council, North Norfolk District Council, Waveney District Council and Tendring District Council.

From a press release:

Support for coastal communities in adapting to coastal change was announced today when the government awarded £11 million in grants to fifteen local authorities who had come up with the best and most innovative ideas for dealing with and adapting to coastal change.

The winning local authorities come from all around the English coast, from Sefton in the North West, to East Sussex in the South East. Each has come up with their own “pathfinder” scheme to work with communities and find ways of dealing with a changing coastline.  Projects range from creating new sand dunes and building boardwalks to, where properties are at risk, developing of ‘buy to let’ schemes and the purchase of land to rebuild properties at risk. (more…)

Beverley and Holderness MP, Graham Stuart, has urged as many Holderness residents as possible to respond to a new Government consultation on coastal change policy.

The consultation looks at how coastal communities can successfully adapt to the impact of coastal change over the next few decades. One of the main issues the Government is keen to look at is the level of assistance afforded to homeowners who are affected by coastal erosion. For example, the consultation asks the following:

• Do you agree that it is appropriate for Government to make available public funds to local authorities to cover demolition costs for which private homeowners are currently liable?
• Is the homeowner assistance package set at the right level to strike the balance between individuals taking responsibility for their investment decisions, and ensuring that local authorities are able to provide practical assistance to homeowners who lose their home as a result of erosion? If not how could this be done?
• How should the payment mechanism for the demolition and moving assistance grant work? What evidence should be provided to Defra to support a claim for demolition and moving costs? (more…)

As sea levels threaten a number of historic properties, the government is considering ways to protect them.

Historic monuments that are threatened with destruction could be moved in exceptional circumstances to a “more sustainable location”, according to a consultation paper released by the Department for the Environment. Coastal defences should be improved in less severe cases and valuable assets recorded in case they are lost forever, it says.

Owners of homes which will be lost to the sea could receive grants to cover demolition and moving costs. (more…)

The government last night announced a raft of new ideas aimed at helping people who lose their homes to coastal erosion – but campaigners said that although the plans had merit, they still fell short of the full compensation package necessary.

Launching a three-month consultation into coastal change policy, Defra officials said they would create a new pot of £11m to help investigate how to address change. Local authorities could bid to become coastal change ‘pathfinders’ and access some of the money.

The Defra consultation will also discuss providing cash to meet certain costs of demolition and moving house for those faced with losing their homes to erosion.

But the suggested figures look to be limited to a maximum of £1,000 to cover removals and redirection of post and up to £5,000 to cover knocking down the threatened property. It would not extend to covering the value of homes, even if they had been previously defended and were now subject to damaged or removed sea defences, a key demand of coastal campaigners in recent years. (more…)

Surely we (the taxpayers) have a right to expect a constructive lead from our Government on issues as important to the well being of our island nation as coast management? What we are getting is a whole series of ‘measures’, ‘plans’, ’strategies’ and ‘policies’ emanating from the centre which are unworkable, unacceptable and seem to increasingly prove how little comprehension exists within central Government and its Quangos of how the coast and its communities function, or what is needed to maintain their functionality through global warming, climate change and sea level rise.

Read the full article by Malcolm Kerby on the Coastal Concern Action Group website.

‘A strategy for promoting an integrated approach to the management of coastal areas in England’ has been published by DEFRA. It sets out the Government’s vision for coastal management, objectives and actions to achieve the vision, and briefly explains how all the changes currently being taken forward will work together in coastal areas.

There surely can be few other areas of Government which provide poorer value for money than DEFRA’s Flood and Coast Protection (F&CP) department.

F&CP now has it’s own “Bermuda Triangle” the three sides of which are DEFRA, Environment Agency (EA) and Natural England (NE).

Dubbed Bermuda Triangle because if one lives on the coast and happens to be caught between those three (one department and two quangos) it is quite likely that one will disappear into the administrative, process led and target orientated black hole which they seem to create.

The only thing which seems to disappear faster than any individual caught in it is taxpayers money.

Read the rest of Malcom Kerby’s comments on the Coastal Concern Action Group website

On the Coastal Concern Action Group website comes a report of a busy week, with meetings of a North Norfolk contingent at the Environment Agency, a DEFRA workshop in Reading discussing adaptation measures, and finally a fact finding trip to Holland organised by CoastNet on behalf of the All  Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Coastal and Marine Issues.

Read the full report >

Also on the CoastNet website >