A WEST Craven county councillor said a 'fresh skirmish in the War of the Roses' has been avoided after Earby was awarded £550,000 in flood work funding from Yorkshire authorities.

Lancashire county councillor David Whipp, who represents the West Craven ward, recently appealed to Yorkshire authorities to consider Earby's Yorkshire 'expats' and demanded the town did not lose out on funding because of its administrative boundaries.

"This is all precipitated by the peculiar geography of Earby," said Cllr Whipp. "Although Earby is in Lancashire, for drainage purposes it remains part of Yorkshire."

“Floodwater knows no boundaries and Storm Eva’s inundation found its way into too many Earby homes and businesses,” he added. “Earby is in the upper reaches of the Aire catchment, one of the few places in administrative Lancashire which drains to the North Sea.

"The catchment is covered by the Yorkshire Regional Flood and Coastal Committee and the Environment Agency based in the North East, with Lancashire looking to the North West.

“There’s a danger that Earby falls between two stools and is overlooked when it comes to flooding. There’s some evidence to show that that’s the case with the Boxing Day event."

However, Cllr Whipp confirmed that £500,000 has been earmarked to carry out work on critical culvert in Earby. A further £50,000 will be used to begin a study to look at options to reduce the flood risk to Earby in the future.

"A fresh skirmish in the Wars of the Roses has been avoided," said Cllr Whipp. "I got an email from the Yorkshire EA saying that the preliminary work on major flood alleviation work for Earby will be funded from their ‘Grant in Aid’ programme and that renewal of a critical culvert in the town, Victoria Clough (which runs below Colne and Victoria Roads), will be brought forward in the current year.

"I'm really pleased they've come up trumps with this funding," added Cllr Whipp. "But this now presents us with the opportunity to draw up a bigger flood alleviation project, which could end being an investment of £2 million."

The West Craven county councillor is also pressing for funding from alternative sources.

“The Government has asked for schemes and we’ve put Earby forward as the top priority in Pendle," said Cllr Whipp. "As well as creating storage areas upstream of Earby, we are suggesting building up the banks of the New Cut beck where it flows through the town.

"There may also be smaller scale work that can be carried out using local resources. All avenues are being explored."

The funding award comes as Earby held two meetings last week to discuss flooding issues