Flooding in Tory voting areas ends the era of austerity

Quote: Mintball "As non sequiturs go, that's spectacular.'"

Awww, shucks, thanks!.

Quote: Mintball "A slight pointIndeed, however, the sea constantly batters our coastline, the natural and man made flood defences do a pretty good year round job of keeping us fairly dry, but there's always that chance that the water being pulled just a bit like [ithat[/i will mean it is able to get through just [ithere[/i.

Quote: Mintball "Yes, electoral considerations may intervene, but the example of the Netherlands is entirely legitimate as one of showing that, irrespective of the political differences of different governments (there have been prime ministers from three different Dutch parties since 1980 as an example), if the political will is there, long-term planning and long-term action can occur.'"
The Netherlands had/has little choice but to invest in flood defences, something like 50% of the country is less than 1m above sea level, which is fine if you're land locked and miles from water, not so much if you're a coastal country.

Quote: Mintball "Successive governments have apparently had scientists warning of what was going to happen, but have chosen to fiddle while the floods become more frequent.'"
Have floods become more frequent, or are they now just being noticed because houses now stand where once was uninhabited land. I don't often agree with Monbiot, but trees make a hell of a difference, and looking at the aerial shots of the flooded areas there's a lack of those to soak up water.

Quote: Mintball "We need some sort of consensus, across all parties, on what needs to be done, because there's no indication that these are simply "freak events", as Owen Paterson likes to characterise them. One would think that that would be common sense.'"

They're not freak events in so much that parts of the country has flooded since the year dot, and will continue to do so, what we have now though are pictures of people up to their knees in water dumbfounded that the lovely house they bought in the country with the river at the end of the garden could end up like this.