PEOPLE should act immediately if a flood warning was issued in their area, the Environment Agency told Richmondshire councillors this week.

Mr Ron Johnson, one of four flood warning officers for the dales, said many people did not realise they might have just two hours to move items to safety and sandbag their property.

Some people mistakenly thought a flood warning would be followed by a severe warning if the situation became dangerous. However, both warnings had the same meaning and the word "severe" was used only if 100 properties or more were in danger.

Mr Johnson, from the agency's York office, gave a presentation on the new flood warning system to the environment committee at Muker on Tuesday.

He said the former programme of yellow, amber and red warnings had been replaced in September by a four-tier scheme.

Flood watch meant there was potential for rising water causing problems and was usually sparked by severe weather warnings from the meteorological office or heavy snowfall in the upper dales.

The next stage - flood warnings and severe flood warnings - must not be ignored by residents or local authorities. "These both mean 'your property will flood - do something now'," he said.

An all-clear was issued when water fell below the level which sparked the flood watch.

Grinton, in Swaledale, and Bainbridge, in Wensleydale, were important sites where river levels and rises were monitored in an attempt to warn communities further downstream of potential flooding.

The agency charter laid down a minimum of two hours' warning to residents, but flood officers aimed to give four hours where possible.

The Environment Agency was responsible for flood protection only on watercourses designated "main rivers."

Mr Johnson said criticism levelled at the agency by people who did not live by "main" rivers, but whose properties flooded regularly, was unfair. It was the Ministry of Agriculture which decided which were "main rivers".

Residents of Skinningrove in the former Cleveland, where homes have flooded repeatedly, want their beck upgraded to a main river. However, Mr Johnson said this would not help their plight, as the agency had limited resources and communities like Skinningrove would have lower priority than high risk areas such as York and Selby.

It was better that the local authority - in this case Redcar and Cleveland council - retained responsibility for flood defences there.

Coun Richard Dunn said the government should change the priority so that rivers such as the Cover, which flooded last month for the first time in many years, were the responsibility of the Environment Agency, which had the expertise to deal with such incidents