Flood and Drought Resilience Taskforce: What Is Actually New?

The Flood and Drought Resilience Taskforce is a government advisory group, chaired by Floods and Drought Minister Emma Hardy, which met for the first time on Wednesday 14 October. Defra announced it on 11 October as a new body. On the evidence published so far, it is the Floods Resilience Taskforce set up in September 2024, renamed and widened to take in drought. The minister confirmed as much to Parliament on 13 October, describing the existing taskforce as "expanded and renamed". It came with no new funding and no new powers.

The announcement was pitched as a response to a year in which England went from a wet winter into its third drought in five years, and the timing makes that easy to believe. The documents say otherwise. The terms of reference that govern the existing body rule out a budget, an operational role in a flood and any formal report that ministers would have to answer, and nothing published at the launch, or since the first meeting on 14 October, replaces them.

Every flood defence figure in the announcement, from £1.4 billion to £10.5 billion, was set out to Parliament on 17 March 2026, seven months before the taskforce was announced.

What was announced?

Defra's press release of 11 October says the taskforce brings the minister together with more than 50 organisations, including the Environment Agency, the Met Office, mayoral authorities, fire and rescue services, and the farming, water and insurance industries. Its stated job is to share expertise on risk, preparedness and a longer-term resilience strategy for floods and drought, with communities given a bigger say.

The release gave the first meeting two subjects: preparedness for flooding this winter, which it says shows the country better prepared than last year, and early lessons from the drought. Both pressures are real. The release describes the driest July in almost two centuries, and Yorkshire moved into drought status on 9 October, leaving only the North East and North West of England outside it.

The minister added some detail in a written statement to Parliament on 13 October, at the start of Flood Action Week. It lists the new members only by type (water companies, Ofwat, farming representatives and community groups) and makes the voice of communities the taskforce's "key priority", without naming a single new community group. It also repeats that the country is better prepared than last year, again with no assessment attached.

The taskforce met in person on 14 October. The Horticultural Trades Association said that morning that its chief executive, Fran Barnes, had been invited, but no attendance list has been published. By midday on 15 October Defra had published no readout, minutes, membership list or terms of reference, and the GOV.UK page for the group still carried the old name, the 45 members of the flood-only body and a last update of 13 March 2026. When the original taskforce first met, on 12 September 2024, Defra reported the meeting the same day.

The rest of the week's announcements came from other bodies:

• 12 October. The Environment Agency launched Flood Action Online, and Defra put three-year targets on the £4.2 billion, covered below. What the campaign asks of households is set out in the Flood Action Week explainer.
• 13 October. Defra and Flood Re announced pilots of Flood Performance Certificates, starting this year: a rating of how well an individual home resists flooding, modelled on the Energy Performance Certificate and explained in the guide to flood performance certificates.
• 15 October. The government declared severe drought in parts of six southern counties after the latest National Drought Group meeting, set out further down.

None of this changes planning policy. A site in a flood zone still needs a flood risk assessment for planning under the August 2026 National Planning Policy Framework, and the taskforce has no part in planning decisions.

Claim by claim: what is new?

Most of it is not new. The table sets each claim in the announcement against the published record, updated to 15 October, and only one of the nine claims is new in full.

What was the Floods Resilience Taskforce?

The Floods Resilience Taskforce first met on 12 September 2024, launched by the then Environment Secretary with Emma Hardy as its regular chair. Its group page on GOV.UK is still live under that name, and describes a forum for advising Defra ministers on flood risk, preparedness, lessons from past floods and long-term strategy, co-chaired by ministers from the Cabinet Office and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

It met roughly every quarter:

1. September 2024. First meeting, focused on readiness for the 2024/25 winter.
2. May 2025. Aintree, hosted by Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service.
3. September 2025. Fourth meeting, which reported three action groups on flood warnings, recovery and insurance.
4. December 2025. Fifth meeting, held in Hull.
5. Early 2026. Manchester, after the winter storms.

The outputs listed after those meetings include the Flood Forecasting Centre's Rapid Flood Guidance service, a 30-day flood outlook, the Environment Agency's new Flood Warning Service and an amended Flood Recovery Framework. Most of those are products of the Environment Agency, the Met Office, the Flood Forecasting Centre and MHCLG, reported to the taskforce rather than made by it. A toolkit on flood warnings for MPs and mayors, sent out in September 2025, is the clearest thing the taskforce produced itself. The minister's March 2026 statement also credited the taskforce with training for more than 1,500 emergency responders and a new Risk Vulnerability Tool for finding the communities most exposed to flooding, alongside improved surface water forecasting. Defra's own place in this system is set out in the explainer on Defra's role in flood risk management.

Is any of the money new?

No. The minister's quote cites £4.2 billion for existing and new flood defences, and the release repeats the pledge of at least £10.5 billion between 2024 and 2036. Both figures come from a written statement to Parliament on 17 March 2026, which set out £4.2 billion over 2026/27 to 2028/29, £1.4 billion of it in 2026/27 for more than 600 schemes.

The 2024 terms of reference state that the taskforce will not manage a budget, so no flood scheme gains or loses money through it.

The claimed return of £8 for every £1 is a long-standing Environment Agency figure, not a new one, and it applies to the whole programme to 2036. The minister's 13 October statement puts the return on the three-year £4.2 billion lower, at "almost £7 of benefit for every £1 invested". How the overlapping totals of £2.65 billion, £4.2 billion, £7.9 billion and £10.5 billion fit together is untangled in the breakdown of the £7.9 billion flood defence programme, and the delivery gap the National Audit Office found is covered in the review of its flood defence findings.

On 12 October, the day after the announcement, Defra opened Flood Action Week with a second release that sets outcome targets for the same £4.2 billion: 200,000 properties to benefit by March 2029, and £27.9 billion of damage avoided. Neither target was in the March statement, which gave only a ten-year figure of 840,000 properties for the wider programme. The minister gave Parliament the same targets the next day, adding 2,500 hectares of habitat and 850 km of improved river. The money behind them has not changed.

The release also reported progress. The £2.65 billion spent in the government's first two years better protected almost 62,000 properties against a target of 52,000, and 93% of flood defence assets were at or above their required condition at the end of March 2026, with 93.5% now the target for March 2029. The minister said the country is "more prepared than ever before" for floods. Those figures measure delivery against targets the government set itself. They do not compare this winter with last, which is what the taskforce release claimed. The 93% is also the annual condition target, not the 98% long-term goal it replaced in reporting, a gap the same National Audit Office review sets out.

Whether the money is enough is a separate question from whether it is new. Sky News, reporting the launch, set the pledge against the government's climate advisers: at least £10.5 billion over 12 years averages about £875 million a year, while the advisers said in May that £1.6 billion a year is needed to 2050 just to keep flood risk near today's level.

What powers does the taskforce have?

Advice is the only power on record. The terms of reference for the 2024 taskforce give it the job of advising Defra ministers. They rule out a budget, an operational role in responding to a flood, and a report of recommendations that government would have to answer. They also say it will complement, not replace, existing emergency structures.

No new terms of reference have been published for the renamed body, so whether any of this changes is unknown. Nothing in the announcement suggests it will, and the minister's 13 October statement describes new members and a new priority but no new powers. Sky News reported before the launch that the relaunched taskforce would have none, and that ministers had stopped short of two things the Environmental Audit Committee recommended: a single dedicated phone line for people who have been flooded, and an overall target for flood defences. Advice cannot set a standard. It cannot change the law either. The Environmental Audit Committee called in October 2025 for national flood resilience standards by 2027, as set out in the summary of its wake-up call report. Schedule 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act, which would make sustainable drainage approval mandatory, is still not in force. Both are decisions for ministers and Parliament, not for an advisory group.

How does it relate to the National Drought Group?

The National Drought Group is the operational body for drought in England, chaired by the Environment Agency and meeting weekly since August 2026. The new taskforce sits above it on strategy, and Defra says the two will stay closely linked, with the drought group's evidence feeding into the taskforce's longer-term work on resilience and preparedness.

The drought group's meeting on 16 September 2026 set out the position the taskforce inherits:

• Extent. Almost three-quarters of England was in drought after a dry spring and summer and five heatwaves.
• Recovery. About 120% of typical rainfall is needed over seven months for every area to come out of drought.
• Outlook. There is roughly a one-in-four chance that around half the country is still in drought next spring.
• Hardest hit. Even in the most likely scenario, Devon and Cornwall and East Anglia stay in drought into April 2027.

The Environment Agency's weekly drought report for 2 to 8 October showed the position three weeks on. Eleven of England's 14 drought areas were then in drought. Reservoir stocks stood at 54%, 21% below average for the time of year, with eight reservoirs or reservoir groups classed as exceptionally low, and hosepipe bans covered all or part of ten water companies' supply areas.

It has since got worse in the south. On 15 October, following the latest drought group meeting, the government declared severe drought in parts of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset, East Sussex and West Sussex, where the South East and South West have had their driest April to September in over a century. Water companies there must check reservoir and river levels daily, the Environment Agency will step up checks on businesses abstracting water, and local resilience forums have been stood up. The minister has told the Environment Agency to put public supply first where it conflicts with environmental rules, so that companies can hold more water in depleted reservoirs. Her statement two days earlier had named Wimbleball and Ardingly reservoirs as the key concerns.

The week's biggest decision on water was taken through the drought group the morning after the taskforce's first meeting, and the release announcing it does not mention the taskforce.

The drought group brings together water companies, regulators, the Met Office, farmers, the Canal & River Trust, anglers and conservation groups. The taskforce adds ministers, councils, emergency services and insurers. One group runs the response; the other is meant to look further ahead.

Is there a case for one flood and drought forum?

Yes. Flood and drought are increasingly one problem. England received 130% of its typical rainfall between September 2025 and March 2026 and then had the driest July on record, and when rain finally fell on that baked ground it ran straight off, which is why floods happen during droughts. The Environment Agency also points out that floodwater is hard to store for public supply because it arrives fast and carries sediment and nitrates.

Reservoirs, wetlands, farm storage and drainage that captures rain all do a flood job and a drought job at once, and a forum that looks at both can see the trade-offs.

Research on climate whiplash in UK rivers points the same way, with floods intensifying in the north and west and droughts in the south and east. Treating flood and drought in separate rooms makes little sense against that pattern. Acting on it, though, needs money, standards and powers, and all three sit with ministers and Parliament, outside a body that meets four times a year to give advice.

What does it mean for development?

The taskforce changes no planning rule. Flood risk and drainage are still decided through the National Planning Policy Framework and the lead local flood authority. What is tightening is water, through policy already in train.

• Flood risk. Unchanged. The Sequential Test and Exception Test and site-specific flood risk assessments still run under the August 2026 NPPF.
• Surface water. The national standards for sustainable drainage systems put rainwater reuse at the top of the SuDS hierarchy. A surface water drainage strategy that designs reuse in serves both the flood and the drought brief, though tanks rarely earn attenuation credit, as the guide to rainwater harvesting in SuDS design explains.
• Water efficiency. Defra has consulted on tightening Part G from 125 to 105 litres per person per day, with 100 litres in seriously water-stressed areas. The government response is still awaited.
• Water supply. Government says water shortages have stalled development in water-scarce areas. Sussex North showed how a supply constraint can hold up schemes whatever their flood and drainage evidence, as the water neutrality explainer records. Parts of East and West Sussex went into severe drought on 15 October; no planning measure came with the declaration.
• Reservoirs. Defra has promised simpler rules for on-farm reservoirs, a review of permitted development rights and up to £15 million in grants. A reservoir holding more than 25,000 cubic metres above ground still falls under the Reservoirs Act 1975.

For an applicant the consequence is serious. Drainage, water supply and water efficiency are all tightening at once, so a scheme with a sound flood risk case can still stall, or be refused, on water. The taskforce will not change that. The published membership of the 2024 body also has no seat for housebuilders or the planning profession beyond MHCLG, the Local Government Association, ADEPT and two lead local flood authorities, so development is unlikely to be the taskforce's focus.

At launch: the verdict

At launch, the Flood and Drought Resilience Taskforce is an existing advisory body with a new name, a drought brief and a longer membership list. It brings no new money and no new powers. Its first public claim, that the country is better prepared than last year, came with no published evidence, and the delivery figures released the next day measure progress against targets rather than against last winter. Adding drought has a clear rationale. The announcement calls it new. The record shows a continuation.

The first meeting has not changed that. By 15 October the minister had described the body to Parliament as the existing taskforce expanded and renamed, repeated the claim of better preparedness without a comparison against last winter, and published nothing from the meeting itself. If the taskforce shaped any of the week's decisions on flood information, Flood Performance Certificates or severe drought, nothing published shows it.

What would change that assessment is something published: new terms of reference, a membership list, minutes, or a resilience strategy with a date on it.

None of that is out of reach: the 2024 body did set up three action groups and send a flood toolkit to MPs and mayors.

What to watch next

• The first meeting's outcome. Whether Defra publishes what the 14 October meeting discussed and agreed, and a date for the second.
• Membership and terms of reference. Whether the GOV.UK page is renamed, the 50-plus members are named and the brief or powers change.
• The drought. Severe drought in parts of six southern counties from 15 October, weekly status updates through the winter, and whether the south is out of drought by spring 2027.
• Flood Performance Certificates. The first pilots, due to start before the end of 2026.
• Part G. The response to the water efficiency consultation, which would change how new homes are fitted out.

Frequently asked questions

For a site affected by flooding or drainage constraints, the requirements are already set by policy, not by the taskforce: a flood risk assessment for planning under the August 2026 NPPF, and a surface water drainage strategy that meets the national SuDS standards.