Nature restoration and flood risk

That this House recognises the vital role nature-based solutions such as wetland restoration, tree planting, restoring bogs and rewilding rivers can play in reducing flood risk; welcomes research by Rewilding Britain that suggests nature-based techniques can decrease flood peaks by up to 50%, making them one of the best defences against flooding; is concerned that despite the clear benefits of nature-based solutions, just 3% of the public funding for managing flood risk in England goes to natural flood management; believes that when one in six homes across the UK are currently at risk of flooding and 1-in-9 new homes are built in flood-risk areas it is vital that investment in nature-based solutions to flooding is scaled up; notes that water companies, many of whom are recording record breaking profits, would be well-placed to invest in nature-based solutions to flooding; further notes that to-date merely advising water companies to do so has not delivered results; and therefore calls on the Government to include in the forthcoming Water Reform Bill a requirement on water companies to use nature-based solutions as a means to improve water and flood risk management services.