COUNCILLORS have agreed to bid for £3 million in European funding to drive forward a flood alleviation scheme to protect hundreds of homes and businesses in Brighouse.

Calderdale Council’s Cabinet agreed to make the application for the cash through UK Government to the European Structural Investment Fund.

If it is successful it will then be match-funded partly by cash from UK Government and from the West Yorkshire Combined Authority, of which Calderdale is a member.

Government has confirmed that any funding from ESIF will be guaranteed if it is secured before the end of 2020, even in event of a “no deal” Brexit.

Coun Scott Patient (Lab, Luddenden Foot), introducing the paper, said a successful bid would take flood alleviation spending in Calderdale to around the £120 million mark.

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A very important scheme for the lower Calder Valley, it would give significant protection around Clifton Beck and Wellholme Park for 57 homes and 258 businesses.

The briefing paper to councillors said phase one of the Brighouse scheme, which is being delivered by the Environment Agency, should reinstate a consistent standard of protection along the River Calder through Brighouse and make improvements along Clifton Beck, specifically where tonne bags are in place at Phoenix Bridge, and will include replacing walls and providing new walls to fill gaps in existing defences.

Coun Patient said the project showed the council’s commitment to combating climate change events throughout Calderdale, which had seen more of them than other authorities, and would see important work planned for the lower valley, following on from the Mytholmroyd scheme, which would be completed next year, and the Hebden Bridge scheme which was soon to begin.

Coun Jane Scullion (Lab, Luddenden Foot) said the scheme would make good and renew defences and culverts which had not really been overhauled since the 1960s, becoming blocked, broken or damaged.

Council Leader Coun Tim Swift (Lab, Town) said: “It is important that we are able to address these issues across the whole of the Calder.”

The Boxing Day 2015 floods which engulfed the valley had been a key moment, he said with Government recognising the real economic risks flooding posed in the long term if homes and businesses could not be better protected.