Ministers must “go further and faster” on UK flood defence spending, the outgoing chair of the country’s flood reinsurance scheme has warned.
Mark Hoban said the government, which has pledged a record £5.2bn on tidal barriers and other defences by 2027, would need to increase funding further as the scale of the challenge from a worsening climate grows.
Flood Re, the public-private insurance initiative set up to support more than 250,000 properties at risk of flooding, is set to end in 2039. But the former City minister said insurance would not “remain affordable” unless far more was done.
According to Bank of England projections, about 2m homes risk becoming uninsurable in 30 years’ time in the most extreme climate-change scenario, in which no additional action is taken against global warming.
