Multi-million investment will protect thousands of Marsh homes

On Friday last week I joined the Chair of the Environment Agency, Emma Howard Boyd, for the opening of the Broomhill Sands and Jury’s Gap coastal defence scheme. This completes a £30million investment which will protect thousands of homes on Romney Marsh. It also follows the £60million spent by the government on building the new sea wall at Dymchurch. Representatives of the Defend Our Coast campaign group, including Terry Preston, Brigitte Bass and Tony Hills were also at Broomhill Sands for the opening ceremony. They have played an important part in securing this investment from the government, through both their detailed knowledge of the flood defence requirements of Romney Marsh, and their work to galvanise local support behind them.

It is vital that the Romney Marsh coast is defended at all of the locations where it could be vulnerable to the sea forcing its way through, powered by the combination of high spring tides and bad storm weather. A breach at one point could lead to flooding in the marsh lands that lie below sea level. That is why the government has announced a further investment of over £65million to upgrade the sea defences at Lydd Ranges, Hythe Ranges, Denge Beach and Romney Sands. These schemes will all be delivered by 2021, meaning that the total government spend on coastal defence for Romney Marsh will be over £150million. These new flood defences will have an operating life of over 100 years, and will ensure that homes and businesses are protected. The latest flood maps for Romney Marsh, which are created by the Environment Agency to help inform the insurance industry, already reflect some of this investment, which means that premiums to cover home insurance are lower.

Last week I met with NuScale Power, an energy company from the United States of America which is interested in investing in the development of small scale nuclear reactors (SMRs) in the UK.  SMRs are considered to represent the future of the nuclear industry, and the government has launched a design and research competition for their deployment in Britain. I believe that Dungeness could be an ideal location for SMRs, because it is an existing nuclear site, with all of the infrastructure needed to support them. SMRs also require a smaller amount of land than some of the larger new nuclear power stations, like Hinkley Point C in Somerset. This could make it much easier to combine both the future interests of the nuclear industry in our area, and the nature conservation requirements to preserve the previously undisturbed areas of shingle at Dungeness. The government’s plan is to work towards the deployment of SMRs by the mid 2020s. As the current operating life of Dungeness B takes it up to 2028, I would like to see new nuclear power sites up and working before the current facility enters decommissioning.  I will do all I can to support the future of this important industry in our area.