BRITAIN NEEDS NEW LAND USE PLANNING REGIME

UK Prime Minister with troops on recent floods tour of duty (Source: Number 10 Twitter account)

The UK Government's response to the flooding crisis followed a typical sequence: inadequate action (crisis, what crisis?), followed by that sinking feeling, panic and blame allocation, and, finally, a sort of belated event management exercise with the army called in to help out. Such criticism may seem unkind, but it should be remembered that since coming to power in 2010 Mr Cameron and his colleagues have conducted a ruthless offensive against the planning system: one of the key mechanisms for reducing the impact of extreme weather events associated with climate change.

In short, Britain needs more and not less planning, and in Southern England, most especially, a return to comprehensive and integrated land use management of the kind found in other densely populated countries like the Netherlands is required. I'm delighted that Mr Cameron has called upon Dutch engineers for advice in dealing with the current floods. Now he and his colleagues should ensure that the best environmental practice from North West Europe is adopted in the English planning system. If current ministers and civil servants are incapable of rising to this challenge, they should be replaced.

UK GOVERNMENT'S LITTLE LOCAL DIFFICULTIES

Image: flood warnings across southern Britain

David Cameron is a modern British leader - in his own words the "Heir to Blair" -  who likes big ideas and dislikes bad news. Like Blair, his government is filled with a monstrous regiment of yes-people, who eshew common sense policies in favour of those which appear to proffer personal advancement. It is no surprise, therefore, that Britain is currently beset by what "One Nation" - now the brand of Ed Miliband's Labour Party - Conservative Harold Macmillan called "little local difficulties."

Foremost of these is "Floodgate". Climate change is not official Conservative Party policy, and, alas, Mr Cameron, along with many others, now finds himself in the position of early medieval English (and Scandinavian) King Canute who famously "set his throne by the sea shore and commanded the tide to halt and not wet his feet and robes. Yet "continuing to rise as usual [the tide] dashed over his feet and legs without respect to his royal person. Then the king leapt backwards, saying: 'Let all men know how empty and worthless is the power of kings (and ill-founded government policies), for there is none worthy of the name, but He whom heaven, earth, and sea obey by eternal laws" according to chronicler Henry of Huntington  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cnut_the_Great#Ruler_of_the_waves

Then there is the prospect of a Disunited Kingdom, and according to the Guardian newspaper today our Olympian "Prime Minister David Cameron will use the scene of Team GB’s success at London 2012 as the backdrop for his warning against Scottish independence."All this, as Russian President Vladimir Putin opens the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi: an event which Mr Cameron will be not be attending. Nor will he attend to calls from Scottish leader Alex Salmond and his colleagues to engage in a debate north of the border. For in the great modern line of political actor-managers, namely Blair and Heir, Mr Cameron will never place himself in a position where he is likely to be upstaged. For whom "The Scottish Play" will prove unlucky is, of course, another little local difficulty.