To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will assess the merits of redesignating her departmental responsibility for coastal erosion as her departmental responsibility for coastal protection.

The Flood and Water Management Act 2010 provides for flood and coastal erosion risk management which will enable a wide range of approaches for dealing with these threats. Risk management includes, but is wider than, coastal protection. It will allow community-based adaptation approaches, such as the current coastal change pathfinder programme, where appropriate. Protection is not the only option or always affordable, sustainable or appropriate, especially where it increases the risk to others. Renaming our departmental responsibility for coastal erosion could narrow and limit our role in this area.