'I warned ministers of extreme flooding'

"When John Prescott told me in 2000 that funding would be increased, I told him it wouldn't be enough. The events of the past few weeks would not have been as serious if the Environment Agency had had the resources it needed. And it has not been made into a co-ordinating authority."

A brief history of the situation makes miserable reading. It began with storm clouds sweeping across the south-east of England. The heavy downpours caused transport chaos in London and the surrounding area. As the storm moved west, it slowed, pouring torrents of rain on to Gloucester, Cheltenham and Worcester. In Evesham, one of the worst-affected areas, 60 people had to be airlifted to safety and more than 70 special needs pupils and teachers were stranded for two nights as roads were cut off.

Thousands of motorists had to abandon their cars as motorways turned to fast-flowing, 6ft-deep rivers. With more water cascading down real rivers, Tewkesbury was overwhelmed at the point where the Avon meets the Severn. The rising waters then flooded a water treatment works in Mythe, near Gloucester, leaving thousands without water before threatening to swamp an electricity substation.

Initially, Britons faced the destruction and devastation with their accustomed stoicism. There was an abundance of community spirit: an aura of "let's all pull together". But when communities such as Hull, where 10,000 homes were wrecked, were left to fend for themselves and looters and cowboy builders swiftly took advantage of vulnerable householders, that quickly dissipated. Almost five weary weeks later those affected in that city are now furious at how ill-equipped the councils, water companies and the EA were to deal with the deluge.

The floods that hit Hull, and the chaos that ensued, should have sounded warning bells. They didn't. Two weeks ago, in the days before the downpours that heralded the floods in Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, forecasters at the Met Office monitored the building storms. They issued an official warning of the impending weather to the EA on Wednesday July 18, a full two days before it hit.

From the agency's headquarters in Bristol, officials were able to watch real-time radar images that charted the progress of the storm clouds as they spiralled towards the UK and then moved across the country, dumping torrents of water in their wake. But despite this early warning, the EA failed to predict the true extent of the floods and mobilise defences in time. What ensued was a bungled attempt to do too little, too late.

Hotel owner Nick Mossop, for example, landlord of the Swan Hotel in Upton upon Severn, was told by the Environment Agency on the Wednesday before the storm that temporary flood barriers were on their way. The next day he was told the defences were now on their way from Kidderminster and would be in place by Friday morning. But by Friday afternoon, as the worst of the storm hit, the barriers had still not arrived. Ironically they were stuck on the motorway - in the floods that blocked the roads to the town.

Flood defences also failed to reach areas of Gloucester when the lorries transporting them became bogged down. It was the second time in a month that the Environment Agency had failed to put up the moveable steel flood barriers to protect the city.

It is little wonder, then, that as the water begins to settle, the initial shock felt by people like Mr Mossop has turned to anger. In the Swan Hotel, which he owns with two friends and which he refurbished earlier this year at a cost of £150,000, litter floats listlessly through the oak-beamed bar. Normally, the riverside pub would be bustling with customers, but four feet of stinking, sewage-filled water - at one stage 6ft deep - now floods it. He blames the EA's tardiness with the barriers.

"We have lost everything that made our hotel what it was," said Mr Mossop. "All the chairs, tables, fittings and kitchen equipment are ruined. There are a lot of angry people here in Upton upon Severn. They promised to have the temporary flood barriers up but they didn't and now they are telling us that they would not have held back the water anyway, but they didn't know that at the time.

"It could have bought us a day to start moving stuff like kitchen equipment out."

He is not alone in his anger over the slowness of the operation. Prof Ian Cluckie, chairman of the government-funded Flood Risk Management Research Consortium and a hydrology researcher at Bristol University, saw the warning issued by the Met Office and believes it gave ample warning of the weather to come.