The morass of flooding politics have claimed a fair few scalps over the years. Those with long memories will recall the struggles of former Culture Secretary Chris Smith, whose lacklustre tenure as chair of the Environment Agency was ended ignominiously back in 2014 after flooding in Devon, Cornwall and the Somerset Levels.

Now Labour is having to grapple once more with this issue, with a number of constituencies affected by Sunday’s floods being held by the party’s leading lights.