This afternoon Greg visited Ickford, who like many communities across the constituency, have suffered considerable flooding.
Greg said: "Particular to Ickford have been a number of issues I have been working with local residents on over recent months. Firstly, I've been pushing Thames Water to sort out considerable issues with the drains in the village that leads to sewerage flooding when the drains are overwhelmed. They have committed to me a plan of works to identify the causes and fix them, but this must happen urgently and I continue to push them.
"Then comes the issue of housing development proposals. It was deeply disappointing that Deanfield Homes were given permission to build a new development this week by the planning inspector. An absolutely ridiculous decision given part of the rationale was a bogus claim that flooding would not be an issue. Along the line, residents of Ickford were told that flooding would be a once in a hundred year occurrence. An offensive claim given the number of times the village has flooded in the last few months alone -- even more so given the very land they want to build on is itself totally flooded right now.
"I have already raised the case of Ickford in the House of Commons, at Prime Minister's Question Time, calling for the way flood risk is assessed as part of the planning process to be seriously beefed up. My view is simply, we simply can't keep building homes in areas liable to flooding -- it will just keep making matters worse. This is an issue I will absolutely continue pursuing - change is needed, and needed urgently."
