Green Party Councillors Report

The past year has thrown up many challenges for the town, not least of which was the terrible flooding that we saw in October and January. These floods were destructive and distressing and many are still living with the after effects.
Our priority was to ensure that those who’s homes were damaged received the support they were entitled to. Following January’s flood, we went door to door to let people know how they could access funding to help with the immediate aftermath and other schemes to protect their homes against future damage.
Residents of Syston were deeply frustrated as they found it difficult to get answers over maintenance of water courses and how to access flood protection. In response to this, we have been working with residents, other tiers of council and the various agencies with responsibilities for flood response. This is in the form of a flooding scrutiny panel at Charnwood to question these agencies and get clear commitments to improve the response to the flooding. We have also joined residents in calling on the Environment Agency to undertake a clean up of the brook and improve flooding alerts. The result of this is that the Environment Agency will be clearing silt and debris from the brook this autumn and a flood alert specifically for the Barkby Brook will be available later this year.
Longer term, we will be making sure that the action plan currently being drawn up by the County Council (the body with the lead responsibility for flooding) is effective, and more importantly, is being followed.
This is the first of what we hope to be a regular column and we are grateful to the editor for affording us an opportunity to reach residents in Syston and beyond.
Laurie Needham, Andy Haynes, David Infield, Chris O’Neill, & Sandra Woodward – Green Party councillors for Syston and surrounding villages.