Letter: Years of under investment to blame for repeated floods in Wakefield

More flooding in the Calder Valley. All the usual places and one or two new ones; Horbury Bridge has flooded more in the last three years than the previous 40.
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Climate change is combining with lack of maintenance, poor asset management and years of under investment to make areas uninhabitable.

There is only so much grit and resilience that people can show before they say ‘You know what, it’s just not viable to live here anymore’.

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The Environment Agency is on a hiding to nothing; more problems than it can deal with, insufficient funding, no clear plan of action and a culture that means it spends almost as much money on proving it is getting value for money as it does on actually doing work.

Areas of Castleford and Horbury Bridge were badly flooded during Storm Ciara last week.Areas of Castleford and Horbury Bridge were badly flooded during Storm Ciara last week.
Areas of Castleford and Horbury Bridge were badly flooded during Storm Ciara last week.

We have had years of under investment in everything that affects our day to day lives. Our environment has been neglected, our infrastructure is falling apart, our NHS is on life support, our public transport system is not fit for anything let alone purpose.

In fact it is hard to see what, if anything, of the things we need and used to be proud of still remain.

Unless I’ve missed something I’m not aware that we have stopped paying income tax, council tax and a myriad of other taxes so where is the money being spent?

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What are we getting for our money? Forget grandiose, multi billion pound vanity projects, let’s get the basics sorted first!

Let’s get back what we used to have, and when we do let’s ring-fence the money to keep it maintained and up to date!

Richard Saberton, via email