By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor
The boss of the Environment Agency Sir Philip Dilley, has resigned. He faced a great deal of criticism during the flood crisis, which wasn’t helped by the fact he was holidaying in Barbados as people in the UK lost everything as the water levels rose.
Dilley claimed he had found the media scrutiny “unacceptable”. He will leave his £100,000-a-year, three-day-a-week at the end of the month.
There have been claims that the Environment Agency misled the public about the location of Sir Philip when they told the public he was “how with his family,” rather than in the Caribbean. He told MPs he had two homes, including one in the Caribbean and he kept in “regular contact” and worked from there.
In his resignation statement he said: “I want to be clear that I have not made any untrue or misleading statements, apart from approving the statement about my location over Christmas that in hindsight could have been clearer.”
Tim Farron the Liberal democrat leader said: “Many staff gave up their Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve. Their boss should have joined them. It seemed to many that this organisation was bereft of its formal leadership when it was most needed”.
Tory MP Nigel Evans said” “It was the worst flooding in the north of England in living memory and people thought it was bizarre that the chairman of the Environment Agency decided to stay on holiday”.
it is doubtful many flood victims will have much sympathy for the untenable position Sir Philip believes he found himself in.
Since you are here
Since you are here, we wanted to ask for your help.
Journalism in Britain is under threat. The government is becoming increasingly authoritarian and our media is run by a handful of billionaires, most of whom reside overseas and all of them have strong political allegiances and financial motivations.
Our mission is to hold the powerful to account. It is vital that free media is allowed to exist to expose hypocrisy, corruption, wrongdoing and abuse of power. But we can't do it without you.
If you can afford to contribute a small donation to the site it will help us to continue our work in the best interests of the public. We only ask you to donate what you can afford, with an option to cancel your subscription at any point.
To donate or subscribe to The London Economic, click here.
The TLE shop is also now open, with all profits going to supporting our work.
The shop can be found here.
You can also SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER .