Pendle News Room

Pendle Council lobbied the Government for the unclaimed Property Level Resilience Grants on behalf of the town so that the area could be made more flood resilient.

Councillor Paul White, Leader of Pendle Council, said: “We’re delighted that £125,000 of the unclaimed grants will be invested in community resilience measures.

“The grants formed part of the Community and Business Recovery Scheme set up by the Government so that councils could help householders and businesses affected by the storms to recover.

“Everyone who has pooled their grant will receive a direct benefit from any measures put in place.

"A great deal of progress has already been made to protect Earby from flooding and this money will help us to do even more.

“We’ll use it to fund measures identified in the Community Flood Plan which was developed by Earby Flood Group.”

These include:

• demountable flood barriers which can be put in place quickly if flooding is possible
• pumps which will help to remove flood water
• better access to sandbags
• raising walls by Earby Beck
• flood proofing Victoria Mill which houses 14 businesses.

Councillor White added: “Thank you to Andrew Stephenson MP for his help in securing the funding for this and for bringing the Flooding Minister, Therese Coffey, to Pendle to see first-hand the problems we’ve had. “

Flood alleviation schemes being managed by the Environment Agency include:

• improvements to Victoria Clough culvert which will help to reduce flood risk in Earby
• schemes to control the rate of water being released into Earby Beck and New Cut, as well as other mitigation measures, during extreme rainfall
• ·natural flood management schemes in the catchments of New Cut and Earby Beck, part of the Leeds Flood Alleviation Scheme Phase2