Climate change and flooding in the UK
Tell the government: we need real protection from flooding
Sign petitionFlooding hotspots in England
Is your community at high risk for flooding? Enter your postcode in the map below to see what’s going on in your area.
How to use the map
This map shows information on flooding risk from Rivers and Seas and from Surface Water (flash flooding) across England by neighbourhood.
It presents the data in three views:
First view
The first view shows the total number of homes and businesses currently within high-risk flooding areas – the pop-up revealed when clicking on a neighbourhood shows the total number of properties at risk and which of these are residential homes.
Second view
The second view shows similar data but under a future climate change scenario where flooding risk has worsened.
Third view
The third view highlights areas that have both high flooding risk to homes and high social risk - where communities are the least able to prepare, respond and recover from flooding.
On this layer, the popup revealed when clicking on a neighbourhood provides some additional information (like the percentage of the people in the area with a disability, the percentage who rent their homes, the percetage who are unlikely to have home insurance, the percentage who are over 65 years of age, etc.).
High risk flooding = once every 30 years. Medium risk flooding = once every 100 years. Flooding risk takes into account existing flood defences and their condition.
If you have trouble interacting with this map on your mobile phone, click here to open our full page view.
Watch: how 2.4 million people are at the highest risk of flooding
Friends of the Earth's CEO, Asad Rehman, explains what's happening with the UK's weather.
Why's flooding getting worse?
Is it possible to stop flooding?
Tell the government: we need real protection from flooding
Sign petitionHow are the political parties responding to flooding?
Labour
While in government, Labour have increased funding for flood defences, announcing £7.9 billion over 10 years, but this falls short of the Environmental Audit Committee’s recommendation of the £1.5 billion needed per year.
It has also failed to strengthen the National Adaptation Programme, inherited from the previous government, despite its own climate advisors saying it’s not up to scratch. The climate plan is overly reliant on new technologies that are unlikely to scale up and deliver the emissions reductions needed.
The Green Party
In May 2025, the Green Party committed to an additional £7 billion annually to be invested in climate adaptation – including flood defences and also extreme heat – which is far greater than other political parties. The Greens also have a strong focus on natural flood management and small-scale household resilience measures.
Reform UK
Reform UK has failed to outline how much they would spend on flood defences. But they have pledged to scrap net zero, cut support for renewable energy and simultaneously increase oil and gas exploration in the UK. This would undoubtedly worsen flooding in the UK and put more communities at risk as the climate crisis heightens due to spiralling emissions.
Conservatives
In government, the Conservatives oversaw the building of more than 110,000 homes in flood zones over the past decade and produced a dangerously weak National Adaptation Programme.
They continue to defend their record in office despite the condition of flood defences deteriorating under their watch, to the point where additional funding for flood defences from Labour still equals real-term cuts. Since the election, they have pledged to scrap the Climate Change Act.
Liberal Democrats
Flooding risk and management is part of the Liberal Democrats 2025 For People, For Planet plan. In it they welcome government levels of funding but don’t say they'd increase them. They also make numerous policy commitments to reduce flood risk and ensure affordable insurance into the future.
Help in a flood