1:33pm Saturday 21st November 2009
GORDON Brown today pledged an extra £1m of Government money to help flood-hit communities in Cumbria.
The Prime Minister announced the funding on a visit to the area, where he met with rescue workers and residents evacuated from their homes after the record-breaking rainfall.
The emergency services were advising people not to return to their houses yet, as forecasters predicted fresh downpours.
The Prime Minister, during a two-hour visit to Cockermouth, met representatives from the emergency services and local people who had been evacuated from their homes and were staying in shelters.
He also toured the devastated centre of the town, which is now strewn with debris from floods, with cars coming to rest against trees from the force of the torrents, shop windows smashed and inches of sludge and silt covering the road.
He announced the government will match the £1m in aid already given by the North West Development Agency.
Mr Brown said: "I have decided we will increase the amount of resources to the community.
"We will match the regional development agency money, to help local businesses, homeowners and tenants, making that £2m.
"We will give an extra £1m so immediate support can be given.
"We will do everything we can to support the local community in its hour of need.
"We are going to remain committed, to do everything we can to help local people here.
"I have met people in the centre I have just visited showing great community spirit.
"A community is a thousand acts of kindness and friendship for each other. It is making me very very proud of this community "The emergency services have worked brilliantly, right across the board.
"This happened with such rapidity, as everybody has been explaining this morning, they looked around and levels were low and suddenly they have gone so high."
He again paid tribute to father-of-four Pc Bill Barker who lost his life when the bridge was swept away in Workington.
"The whole community is devastated by the loss of his life and he will be remembered as a hero," he said.
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