Matthew Ellis

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A very bold statement I know but one that I hope will be true for the village of Elford near Tamworth.

I’ve written quite a few times about Elford since the terrible flooding there about a year ago. Since that time I’ve been working with different public agencies to try and find a pragmatic long term solution to the problem which saw dozens of homes flooded and meant an expensive operation twice for emergency services and other authorities during the flood period.

It also meant real hardship for many families who spent months and months not being able to be in their own homes, including over Christmas. The Environment Agency have been helpful and commissioned a new super pump which would clear much of the major flood water in similar circumstances to last time.

And this week my work with a small group of public agencies I convened four months ago to look at a small but significant flooding problem which the EA pump does not prevent came to fruition. It was one of those difficult problems where right from the start there was a liklihood of the different water management authorities passing the buck by claiming the particular water, river, highways drain or just surface water, was a different orgaisation’s responsibility.

And it did start off a bit like that. But once we got the right ‘culture of pragmatic thinking’ the different organisations have come together to just get the job done. The final piece to the flood mitigation jigsaw came into place after I made contact with the Chief Executive of Severn Trent Water PLC.

Without any obligation to do so, he agreed for the company to carry out some work on private land, at their expense, which would have been far more complicated legally for the EA or County to do. I was rightly critical of STW during the floods of last year but the new boss of the company has been excellent showing a real sense of social responsibility. The work starts next Monday and I’m very grateful to them. Well done Severn Trent… a good example of a public utility which is prepared to put helping a local community before their balance sheet.

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I went to a public meeting in Harlaston on a recent evening.

As well as looking the very image of a traditional English village it has another very special quality… a community spirit which is the essential lifeblood of any rural community. The meeting was to discuss the parish plan which has just been prepared and the great thing was the number of local people who attended.

Often when I go to meetings in local villages the turnout is anything but healthy but in Harlaston not only was it well attended those who were there were more than willing to roll their sleeves up and get involved in improving the local area.

And it shows… if Harlaston wins the Best Kept Village many more times there’ll have to be a special award for them. Look out other Staffordshire villages; they’re aiming for the top spot again this year and I wouldn’t bet against them getting it!

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The local elections last Thursday were extraordinarily good for Conservatives on the face of it. But were they so good they could be bad?

National opinion on Gordon Brown is so negative that, in my view, the biggest threat to Conservatives winning nationally at the next General is for the current Prime Minister to resign or be pushed out. With a new Labour leader it may just make the job more difficult for Tories.

With a bad result in the local elections the Labour Party would have seen it as a wake up call. But the catastrophic result for Labour means it all the more likely for Gordon Brown to go.

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After the dreadful flooding in New Mill Lane in Fazeley last year I’m delighted that the lobbying of the Environment Agency to build some substantial flood defence in an effort to stop damage to property through flooding has paid off.

I’ve spoken to the EA numerous times over the last six months in an effort to move things along and when I visited locals in the Lane today I found they had done their fair share of badgering too.

So, it’s taken a while but the job being done looks good and I struggle to see how flooding would be a problem to houses there again. Here’s hoping.

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