WAYS to alleviate flooding problems in South Craven went down a storm with councillors this week following June's cloud-burst.

And while they agreed they couldn't ban rain clouds, Craven District Councillors agreed to set up a working group to look at Craven as a whole and investigate the reasons behind the continual floods.

Even stepping back in time and reappointing a civil defence person in each village to forewarn residents of imminent flooding was an idea put forward for consideration.

Coun Steve Place said Sutton was "akin to a tropical rain storm" during last month's deluge with the park being completely decimated.

"Children were swimming in the water not knowing it was a mixture of surface water and raw sewage. It cannot be a coincidence that 50 per cent of the village went down with a sickness bug the day after," he said.

Coun Place said the flooding problems all over South Craven needed to be looked at seriously.

"Some homes in the area have been flooded three times in the last 18 months. There is a chance that insurance companies will declare the area as high risk and people will not be able to insure their homes any more."

In addition, Cononley suffered problems as did Cowling and Glusburn. There was further flooding in the west and north of the district in Earby, Grassington, Gargrave and Hellifield.

Coun David Crawford urged the committee to look at the problem Craven-wide and not simply treat it as a problem in the south.

He said the River Aire flooded upstream as well in Bell Busk and that one of the problems was that water could not get away in sufficient quantities down stream.

"I want to be sure that upstream of Gargrave is taken into consideration and that any work which is carried out does not make it more difficult for water to get away onto flood plains," he said.

Coun Peter Walbank said Grassington also had a problem where ancient runways for water had been built on in the past, leaving water running off the hillside nowhere to go but through houses.

"We have to look at the problems of flooding all over as it is going to happen again," he said.

The new sub-group will look at planning issues, particularly around flood plains and whether dropped kerbs are allowing floodwater easier access to homes, discouraging the use of quarry bottoms and aggregate in roads and lanes which wash into drains and block culverts, planting more trees, and whether riparian owners could be encouraged to look after their own stretch of land which borders waterways.

Other topics to look at would be possible changes in farming and whether land could be adapted to become more porous and if more ditches could be created to channel water from the hillsides away from residential areas.

The sub-group will be made up of at least six councillors from all of the Craven regions and will eventually incorporate outside bodies such as Yorkshire Water, North Yorkshire County Council, the Environment Agency and an "outside" independent professional who could view the situation initially and advise on courses of action.

It will also look at funding as well as ways to inform people of who to contact in an emergency for such items as sandbags.