While New Jersey, New York, and other New England states continue the slow and agonizing recovery from the impact of Superstorm Sandy, the United Kingdom is also drying out following serious and major flooding in large parts of the country as the result of torrential rainfall. The impact of the flooding has once again renewed the debate on flood defenses, much as the impact of Sandy has also focused attention again on flood defenses.

In a report on the BBC News website, Roger Harrabin, the BBC’s environmental analyst, writes on “How Much Can New Barriers Help?” In the United Kingdom, following a series of devastating floods in 2007, he wrote that “there has been major spending to protect people from rising water.” But as Harrabin points out, “Flood protection was due to be extended much further, but the government cut back the number of schemes to save public finances; it’s a decision that the prime minister will be pressed to re-examine.”

Harrabin quotes Alan Werrity, a former director of Dundee University’s Centre for Research on Water, who told BBC News “that people at risk of flooding should install hard floors, raise plug point (electrical outlets), keep their treasured possessions out of reach of water—and not place total reliance on the government. The UK will face more floods. We need to be prepared—and stop making things worse.”

Following the 2007 floods, Sir Michael Pitt chaired an independent review of the response to the flooding. The Pitt Report was published in June 2008. In April 2010, the government passed the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, which implemented many of Sir Michael Pitt's recommendations.