UK hit by two massive storms in a week

DAVID MARK: This week two fierce storms have battered an already wet and weary England and Wales.

Flood waters have been rising to record levels.

The British government has swung into action in the face of what's been called 'an almost unparalleled natural crisis'.

The prime minister, David Cameron, has declared no money will be spared in the relief effort.

As TV and newspapers provided extensive, non-stop coverage of the flooding this week, one man swam against the tide.

Peter Oborne, of the UK's Daily Telegraph, wrote a column reflecting on why people, politicians and the media needed to ramp up the drama of the situation, which he says has been hysterical and even selfish.

He spoke to Europe correspondent Mary Gearin in London.

PETER OBORNE: What I was trying to do in this piece was just put it into an element of perspective. Actually, you know, all the media articles have gone on about how dreadful our flood defences are. The truth is that we we've had enormous rain and the reality is that our flood defences are wonderful. You know, they've concentrated on the 5,000 or 6,000 people flooded out of their homes. There's about 1.2 million people who've been protected and kept dry in their homes and I just tried to keep a sense of proportion about that.

MARY GEARIN: I guess there's two things here. It's the perspective of the people affected and the perspective of the media or the perspective the media wants to take.

In terms of the people affected, there have been some people who've said well the government should pull back on overseas aid and help its own people. I mean, what do you think of that argument?

PETER OBORNE: Well, once again it's the failure of perspective and I think it's even a little bit selfish. There have been attempts in sections of the media and in fact some of the flood relief groups to say look, we're now living in third world conditions and when I heard that I went out and checked, you know, what's it like, can you have a flood in the third world?

Well, you know, Bangladesh is basically half of it was under water and millions of people just completely lost their livelihoods in the Bengal and Bangladesh flooding quite recently and 30,000 people were drowned in Venezuela in 1999.

I personally reported on the floods in Pakistan when the Indus broke its banks. I was there and the momentous suffering which people in developing countries suffer from. You know, more recently the Philippines flooding. I mean, what, and there is a little of a sense of little lack of proportion I think we're talking about here that even in the Somerset levels where I feel really sympathetic to maybe 100 people who've had to leave their homes and their livelihoods are under threat, you know, we're not talking about millions of people being flooded out of their homes and thousands being drowned and then to say look we want to stop helping people in countries where the floods have taken place, where thousands have been drowned to effect repairs, you know, in houses in England.

There's a little bit of a sense of selfishness, a national selfishness. And so parts of my purpose of my article was to say: look, just remember how lucky we are.

MARY GEARIN: Is this a normal reaction though for people who are experiencing difficulties or is there something more at play in your mind about this? Is it modern life, is it modern England, is it, has the stoicism, the famous stoicism changed?

PETER OBORNE: Well, I think a lot of those stoicism we've seen actually cause you know, it's not pleasant to suddenly find your house under water and your farm completely kind of wiped out and you having to move your animals and all the rest of it. And I think the people who have suffered that have been pretty stoical for the large part.

But there is a something about public discourse and I think we in the media are to blame as much as the politicians, even perhaps more, that we must sensationalise and present some sort of once in a lifetime calamity, something which is fundamentally actually normal.

There have always been floods, there's always been bad or something, some other natural phenomenon. There's always been bad weather and they need to find somebody to blame, find somebody to praise, you know.

There is a narrative going on here and I think it's a media political narrative which is at variance with the experience, lived experience, of ordinary people living through these floods.

So I don't think it's a national phenomenon, truly, it's a Westminster bubble phenomenon in many ways.

MARY GEARIN: And in fact on that point many political journalists are saying that David Cameron's put himself right in the centre of this either reacting to or then causing that media bubble to percolate if you like so...

PETER OBORNE: Oh look, you've got to feel some way, you've got to feel sympathetic to the politicians, not just Mr Cameron, but the leader of the opposition, Ed Miliband. I mean if they don't do anything then they get criticised for not caring. If they go out in their Wellington boots, we've all seen the pictures, they're criticised for grandstanding.

It's very difficult to navigate this sphere and I feel though that Mr Cameron has got too excitable about it all, but maybe he's prime minister and he's got to sort of deal with the press and I haven't. It's easy for me to say that but you know, I didn't like it yesterday when there was a meeting of COBR (Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms), a rather sort of ostentatious body which deals with national emergencies and Mr. Cameron on her personal Twitter account, you know, twittered out a picture of him leading this meeting.

It's where sort of presentation and reality sort of merge and I would have preferred him not to have done that and I felt also that there was another attempt to sort of stir up political rows about it, when really the thing to do is to sort it out as best they can. Which by the way they are doing very well and I think we've forgotten that fact, that actually we're really rather good at this.

DAVID MARK: Peter Oborne, from the UK's Daily Telegraph and he was speaking to Mary Gearin.