The Met Office has confirmed that more than double the average amount of rainfall for September has fallen in a matter of days, leaving surface water and river flooding affecting large counties such as Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire, Shropshire, Gloucestershire and Worcestershire.

Some counties in southern and central England have already had more than 250% of their average September rainfall, with the month’s full provisional statistics to be released on 1 October.

The heavy rain and thunderstorms have led to around 650 properties being flooded. However, the Environment Agency estimates that at least 8,200 have been protected. Over 60,000 properties received flood warnings over the past week. Heavy rainfall this week has led to localised river and surface water flooding across central England, Yorkshire and the North East.

Floods Minister Emma Hardy and Environment Agency Chief Executive Philip Duffy met last week to discuss response to the flooding experienced by the country in the last few days.

During the meeting, the Minister received a briefing on the latest situation on the ground and together they discussed how to bolster the response from the Environment Agency, emergency services and local authorities.

The Government is working at pace to step up further preparations for the winter. Lessons learned from these floods are being fed directly into the new Floods Resilience Taskforce to speed up the development of flood defences and bolster the nation’s resilience to extreme weather.

Floods Minister Emma Hardy said the Government is working at pace to accelerate the building of flood defences through the new Floods Resilience Taskforce.

The Taskforce brings together the Secretary of State and Minister Hardy with representatives from Defra, MHCLG, Home Office, Cabinet Office, the Environment Agency, the Met Office, Local Resilience Forums, Mayoral Offices, emergency responders and the National Farmers Union, among others.

EA Chief Executive Philip Duffy said:

“With a wet autumn forecast, we are redoubling efforts to repair and maintain our flood defences and work with communities across the country to prepare for more wet weather.”

Environment Agency teams remain on the ground across the country, checking flood defences, erecting temporary barriers, clearing blockages in storm drains and supporting local authorities in their response work.

The Environment Agency has 250 high volume pumps either in action or on standby at strategic locations across the UK. They have also stepped up the maintenance of flood assets – with 216,000 checks on 75,000 flood assets conducted in the past year which is an increase from 150,000 in an average year.

Rain in flood hit areas

Katharine Smith, Flood Duty Manager at the Environment Agency, said rainfall arriving on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday gives potential for further minor surface water and river flooding impacts across parts of England and Wales.

Through Monday as the area of low pressure clears to the east, further rain will sink south and is likely to fall over areas impacted by flooding through the last week across the Midlands.

A separate Yellow warning for rain is in place from 08:00 on Monday to 03:00 on Tuesday covering parts of the north-east Midlands and east and northeast England. There is significant uncertainty in the amount of rainfall and location of the largest totals for this warning, but 20-40 mm of rain could fall quite widely with a chance that a few places could see 60-80 mm. Strong northeasterly winds will accompany the rain.