After reports Cameron had personally ordered homes in council tax Band H – the most expensive in England – to be included in the Flood Re scheme, the British Property Federation (BPF) repeated its calls for fairness in the scheme’s operation.
Flood Re caps the amount that households will have to pay for buildings insurance. While some homeowners are included, millions are not, including 4m properties in the private rented sector, and several million leasehold properties.
The BPF estimates that here are over 840,000 leasehold properties in flood risk areas in the UK and an estimated 70,000 of these are at high risk.
Ian Fletcher, director of policy at the British Property Federation, said: “It seems incredible that the government would make a concession for one group of well-off homeowners, and yet leave out another less well-off group. This is an issue of basic fairness – all home owners should be treated equally in the Flood Re scheme and have access to affordable cover. It should not matter how wealthy they are, or if they live in a house or a flat. So far as flood cover is concerned we do not appear to be ‘all in this together’.”
On 11 February, the Prime Minister promised unlimited public funds and a wider role for both the State and the army to tackle the flooding crisis.
Under the terms of last summer’s agreement between insurers and ministers, flood-prone areas in England and Wales will be able to get flood cover from 2015 – thanks to a £10 levy on every household.
But nearly 9,000 households were excluded from the agreement because their properties are either newly built or of high value.
