'We're a forgotten community, no one is listening'

Residents of a street in Lincolnshire say they have been abandoned by the Environment Agency after being hit by flooding for a second time in two years.

One family in Lindholme, Scotter, which runs alongside the River Eau, demolished their house and rebuilt it following flooding in 2019, while another homeowner said the value of her property had fallen by 40% since flooding in October 2023.

Following the latest incident on Monday, they say they feel like the "forgotten community" with no hope the issue will ever be resolved.

The Environment Agency (EA) said it was actively working to support affected communities in the county.

Jane Ireland's home was heavily damaged in the 2023 floods caused by Storm Babet and she had to move into rental accommodation until repairs were complete.

She returned home in June 2024 to find the property, which she had put up for sale shortly before the flooding, had almost halved in value.

Ms Ireland said the latest incident had left her "absolutely devastated".

She added: "When we moved in, we did every check possible and knew about a flood in 2019, but were told by the Environment Agency it was a man-made error and wouldn't happen again.

"It's got to the stage now where we feel we are the forgotten community. No one is listening to us."

Philip and Laura Calvert said they had had to take "drastic action" following flooding in 2019, demolishing their house and rebuilding it 1.7m (5.6ft) above ground level.

Although that means their home is no longer at risk, it has not made the suffering any easier.

Mrs Calvert said: "We took the drastic action of knocking it down and rebuilding at a really high cost to us just to protect ourselves because we have no confidence that anything is getting done to the river."

She said her child had not wanted to go to sleep on Monday night because he was worried about the risk of their home flooding again.

"He was crying, saying he was going to drown in his sleep. Even though there's no way now, he was still scared," she said.

"There are elderly people on the street with health problems and you can see them every time it rains, at the windows, looking at the river and they shouldn't have to live like that.

"We feel the Environment Agency thinks there is not enough properties here that it affects so they think it's not worth their money and we are just left."

The residents want the river dredged and maintained, and work to be carried out to the banks and drainage systems.

The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs said the government had inherited flood defences "in their worst condition on record" and had committed £2.4bn over the next two years to maintain, repair and build flood defences throughout the country.

A number of areas in Lincolnshire were hit by flooding this week.

An EA spokesperson said it had been "closely monitoring the situation, deploying teams to check assets, clear blockages and provide real-time assessments of river levels".

They added: "We have issued at least 35 flood warnings. We will be conducting a thorough review to understand the impact and causes of the recent flooding and whether changes to our flood warning system is possible.

"Our priority is to reduce the risks from flooding for communities and we will continue to do everything we can to manage and mitigate the impacts of flooding."

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