Since the start of December, Scotland has faced a series of storms, one following quickly on the heels of another. These have brought tremendous disruption, particularly through flooding events affecting many communities across much of Scotland.
“Exceptional” is a term that can be overused, but in the context of the past six weeks it is indeed appropriate. December 2015 and January 2016 saw many records broken. Rainfall was the greatest in the past 100 years of available records; water levels in Newton Stewart were the highest in 53 years; in Inverurie, water levels were the highest in 45 years; and the Dee at Ballater was at its highest level in 87 years. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency recorded over 50 new record river levels across Scotland and, in many cases, previous records were exceeded by substantial margins.
The scale of the events was exceptional but so, I believe, was the response to protect our communities. The collective efforts of our responders, working very closely together, were first class. The timing of storm Frank could not have been worse, with communities and responders planning for the new year. That is usually a period of festivity and hope but, for communities such as Ballater, which I visited on hogmanay, and Newton Stewart, which was visited by the First Minister and the Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform, it was far from festive and hopeful. However, although those communities saw a terrible start to the year, they continued to demonstrate a strong community spirit.
The Scottish Government resilience room—SGoRR—was actively engaged with the situation throughout, with frequent ministerial resilience meetings to ensure that all that the Scottish Government and its agencies could do was being done. We heard first-hand reports from the national police and fire services, which demonstrated the benefits of the new structures. Those benefits included getting specialist support such as water rescue craft quickly from one part of the country to another and the provision of relief to local teams who had been at the heart of the initial responses.
That first-class response was greatly aided by planning and preparation that were supported by forecasts from the Meteorological Office and SEPA, which allowed preparations to be undertaken and resources to be stood up in advance of their immediate requirement. Their forward look also allowed good planning to respond to needs, ensuring that individuals and teams were not strained too heavily.
Local authorities were at the heart of the efforts to respond, putting in place immediate defences and, where required, setting up rest centres. There was a concerted effort involving a range of functions in response to the flooding, including social care as well as emergency response. Their efforts were based on a substantial foundation of preparation, response and recovery, and I recognise their achievements in what were challenging circumstances.
While the efforts of local authority staff and emergency responders were critical and deserve recognition, I should also highlight the role played by third sector organisations and communities. None of us will have failed to be impressed by the spirit that was shown in many of the communities, particularly by firefighters, who put to one side their concerns about the flood risk to their own households to support their communities. Communities have joined together to deal with both the response and, now, the recovery, and I pay tribute to all those who are involved in that process.
We will review recent events with the aim of learning lessons to help with future emergency responses. That is regular practice following a SGoRR activation, with officials and responders reviewing the circumstances of the event to identify lessons to be learned, which will be acted on to provide a continuous improvement regime. Ultimately, the learning that is identified is captured and utilised to review and improve the delivery of response and recovery actions by statutory organisations, voluntary agencies and central Government in order to provide the best possible service to our communities, such as was seen in the tremendous joint efforts to tackle issues arising from this winter’s storms.
The Government has also been quick to respond to the move from response to recovery. On each occasion, we have been quick to activate the Bellwin scheme. It was triggered on 7 December 2015 as a result of storm Desmond and on 30 December 2015 as a result of storm Frank, and it remains active in the aftermath of the latest severe flooding. The Scottish Flood Forum, which is financially supported by the Scottish Government, has been swift to offer local support and advice.
On 16 December, I announced as part of the budget statement the allocation of £4 million of Barnett consequentials to support those who were affected by storm Desmond. Last Thursday evening and Friday morning, we saw some very significant impacts in the north-east of Scotland. On Saturday, as the communities there dealt with the immediate clear-up, the First Minister announced a further round of support totalling £12 million.
The first key element of that package is the provision of funding to local authorities to allow them to make payments of £1,500 for households, businesses, charities and community groups that have been affected by flooding. That money would be paid from allocations made to local authorities by the Scottish Government. If a local authority did not receive an allocation, it can seek recompense from the Scottish Government to make such a payment, thereby ensuring that any individual in any part of Scotland can receive support if they have been affected by flooding.
Secondly, a flat-rate grant payment of £3,000 will be available to businesses in any part of Scotland where there is evidence that their ability to trade was severely impacted by flooding at the beginning of January. The grant will be a one-off payment to offset costs that cannot be covered by existing insurance—for example, clean-up costs, the cost of materials and exceptional costs to help the business to restore trade, such as marketing and promotion costs. That will be funded by the Scottish Government in addition to the local authority allocations.
Thirdly, the Scottish Government will make available £5 million to assist with the reinstatement of infrastructure that has been lost as a result of the recent flooding. A specific allocation will be made to Aberdeenshire Council to support the reinstatement of the A93 between Ballater and Braemar. The exact sum will be dependent on discussions with the local authority. Further bids from local authorities are now invited.
Finally, the Scottish Government will open an agricultural flood bank restoration grant scheme that will be available to the farming community to seek financial support to restore damaged flood banks. The total available will be up to £1 million. Further discussions will take place tomorrow between the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Food and Environment, SEPA and NFU Scotland to discuss how we effectively involve and support the farming community in managing such conditions.
The Government has made those announcements as swiftly as possible after the conclusion of the weather events. That ensured that all partners maintained a clear focus on resolving the emergency situations, and it enabled us to gather a picture of the scale of the events to give clarity about the financial support that could be provided.
Today, the Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities is writing to the United Kingdom Government to ask it, as the member state, to make an application to the European Union solidarity fund. The solidarity fund was established after the severe flooding in central Europe in 2002. Payments can be made to help fund emergency operations to deal with non-insurable damage such as salvage operations, repair of infrastructure and cleaning. Applications can be made only by member states. The UK received €162 million after the 2007 floods, but it has so far declined to make an application in relation to the recent flooding. We are asking that it now does so, as a successful application might well provide additional and welcome funding to local authorities to deal with the impact of the past few weeks.
December 2015 was the wettest on record. Climate change brings the likelihood of even more frequent severe weather events. It is important that we are prepared and, to that purpose, the Parliament approved the Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009. Yesterday, the Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform launched our first-ever flood risk management plan and 14 local strategies, which set out investment plans of more than £235 million in 42 flood protection schemes that will protect more than 10,000 properties. The national plan allows us to target investment and co-ordinate actions that will reduce flood risk. The strategies contain measures such as natural flood risk management, where it is appropriate, as well as initiatives such as flood warning and community engagement.
The flood risk management plan and the local strategies are the culmination of a number of years of work to identify current flood risk. They set a clear agenda for action over coming months. The strategies, which have been developed collaboratively, are not static plans, and they will continue to be informed by the work undertaken by SEPA and other bodies, overseen by the Cabinet sub-committee on climate change, to ensure that our approach adequately addresses the latest climate change projections. SEPA provided excellent technical support and advice in informing those plans, and worked closely with local plan partnership teams. The public were also engaged before the strategies were finalised.
The strategies set the framework for the first six-year planning cycle. In June, the local authority-led partnerships will set out the detailed plan of action, which will provide additional local detail on delivery between 2016 and 2021. This massive programme demonstrates the seriousness with which the Government takes flood risk and the steps that we are taking to reduce that risk across Scotland.
As a Government, we are committed to investing in flood risk management as an investment in the future. The recent budget identified the need to maintain future investment in flood protection schemes and protected support for flood warning and forecasting. Recent events have shown the importance of that.
I repeat the Government’s appreciation for those involved in the front-line response in protecting communities across Scotland from the recent severe weather events. We recognise that flood risk management is a long-term priority. We are committed to reducing the risk, we have put in place a framework to deliver improvements and we are working to ensure that investment continues to be made available to support delivery across the country.