Anxious members of Morpeth Town Council have called on the Environment Agency to review its timetable for flood alleviation works following another scare in the area last month.

Dozens of residents in the Riverside and High Stanners area were put on flood alert on July 17, less than a year since their homes were wrecked in the devastating deluge of September 6.

The Environment Agency is working on flood alleviation plans, but has warned they are unlikely to be in place until 2013.

And councillors are wary about applying too much pressure over fears that the end result may cause more harm than good.

Coun Nic Best said: "I understand the importance of getting the Environment Agency to slim down its processes as much as possible, but we don't want that to be at the expense of proper consideration to get a properly designed plan.

"If we rush it we could get a poorly designed plan that diverts the water to inappropriate places because we didn't look at the whole catchment of the Wansbeck.

"We need to give time to design the thing properly and consult on it properly.

"I understand the urgency of getting it done, but if we don't do it right we are going to have more problems later on."

Coun Andrew Tebbutt was also concerned.

"We need to get it right when the Environment Agency does this because it will be the last money it spends on Morpeth for years afterwards," he said.

"If we rush it on a scheme that isn't properly thought through, we will have a flood defence system that doesn't work properly and no opportunity of getting it remedied for many years."

However, others were more bullish about the demands.

Coun Derek Thompson said: "I would go back to the Environment Agency to ask for short-term remediation to reassure the people in the flood plain that something is being done.

"If they have to wait four years that is a huge amount of stress for them to put up with."

And Coun David Parker, who proposed a formal motion, said it was appropriate for the Council to apply pressure.

"The need for this scheme to be in place as early as possible is absolutely crucial," he said.

"Whilst we were told the timetable is fixed and unlikely to change, I still feel it would be right on behalf of the town that we check on that again.

"As it stands at the moment, for the next four years, for people who live in the town centre areas, the possibility of flooding is there.

"That is a long time."

The Council agreed to raise the matter with the Environment Agency to find out if there is any chance of an earlier completion date.

Members will also ask about the possibility of clearing the river bed following calls from Coun Thompson.

However, Coun Best warned that dredging may cause more damage.

"Dredging the river is a short-term solution because the flow of the river will replace the mud and gravel and in that process it causes erosion upstream and instability of the banks.

"The Environment Agency doesn't see it as a permanent solution and it would be an expensive ongoing thing," he said.

Morpeth Flood Alleviation Scheme Project Manager Phil Welton confirmed that dredging would be unsuitable as it could cause ecological problems, may have little effect and is not a long-term solution.

And he said there is nothing the Agency can do to speed up work on the Morpeth defences.

"We need to go through the right processes and do a full appraisal and modify and develop the right scheme for Morpeth," he said.

"We need a certain amount of time to do that work and then we have to present the case to the Government to get the funding to do the scheme.

"We really have made it as efficient as we can and we did knock four months off the programme, but it is quite an efficient, tight project and it is unlikely we can move it on from that.