A further round of dredging will take place on the Somerset Levels this winter after additional funding was approved.

The Parrett Internal Drainage Board has been carrying out water injection dredging on the River Parrett and River Tone for the last few years following successful trials in late-2016.

The Somerset Rivers Authority (SRA) board voted in Taunton on Friday morning (September 16) to grant an additional £137,000 to fund a further round of dredging this winter to protect communities on the Somerset Levels and Moors from flooding.

However, to achieve this, a smaller-scale flood prevention scheme for a village near Burnham-on-Sea has been pushed back.

The SRA allocated £497,000 in its 2018/19 budget for dredging key sections of both the River Parrett and River Tone using bank-based excavators.

However, following further successful trials, water injection dredging (which is carried out with a moving barge) was used instead, at a lower cost to the taxpayer.

The “substantial savings” this generated were reinvested to further dredges in 2019/20 and 2021/22, with £133,000 being left off at the end of the latter course of dredging.

To allow further dredging to take place over the winter of 2022/23, the board voted unanimously to provide a further £137,000 of funding to the internal drainage board to oversee the project.

Rob Kidson, the drainage board’s project engineer, stated in his report to the board that the funding for this would come from postponing a separate improvement project in East Brent.

He said in his written report: “The East Brent asset improvement project, which received SRA local partner funding this year of £144,000, may not be deliverable in the current year.

“As delivery partner, we are suggesting that the funds allocated are deferred to enable the winter dredging to proceed.

“This will have a neutral effect on the overall SRA enhanced programme contingency budget at this time.”

The East Brent scheme entailed replacing and upgrading “unstable stone-filled cage defences” along Brock’s Pill Rhyne, the village’s main drainage watercourse which runs from the village under the M5 and into the Mark Yeo near Rook’s Bridge.

The scheme, which was due to be carried out by the Axe Brue Internal Drainage Board, would benefit at least 12 residential properties along with a local holiday cottage business, the Brent Area Medical Centre, the B3140 and around 20 hectares (around 49 acres) of agricultural land.

While the SRA has not yet published details of next year’s budget, it is likely that the East Brent scheme will be postponed until mid-2023 at the earliest.