Opposition to flood plain flats

Lewes District Council has agreed the application to develop the land on Southdowns Road.

Flood campaigners have written a series of letters to the Government to protest against the plan and are considering making a formal complaint against the Environment Agency (EA) for not doing more to stop the development.

Tom Crossett, flood defence co-ordinator for Lewes Flood Action Group, said Lewes District Council approached the EA for advice on the application but claimed the agency failed to take into account recent government guidelines on building on flood plains.

The guidelines include looking a the long-term future for a building on the flood plain and also take into account cimate change and rising sea levels.

Mr Crossett said: 'The district council was in a difficult position because outline planning permission has already been granted but the EA should have explained to planners the whole situation has changed because now developers must think about the whole lifetime of the building.'

Lewes Flood Action Group has written to ask the Government to allow councils to defer all applications for major developments on the floodplain until Lewes has a local development framework (LDF) which can take into account the increased threat of flooding.

The letter stated: 'The problem here in Lewes, and I suspect elsewhere, is that we have not yet been able to use the new tools to complete an adequate strategic flood risk assessment.

'We, therefore, still lack a robust local development framework and applications for more than 1,000 homes in the floodplain may come forward before our LDF is in place.'