HOMES and businesses in a village near York have received a huge boost with the unveiling of major new flood defences.

The 1,000 metres of reinforced concrete and earth embankments run the length of the River Derwent through Stamford Bridge, and are designed to protect 22 businesses and four homes, most of which were inundated in 1999 and 2000.

The £3.7 million scheme, which was unveiled by East Riding of Yorkshire councillor and Stamford Bridge parish councillor Hilary Saynor, and took more than a year to build.

To mark the occasion, pupils from Stamford Bridge Primary School were asked to create a design for the mug, depicting the flood defences.

Pupil Sarah Rutherford, 11, came up with the winning entry and Roy Parsley, who runs The Pottery studio in the village, reproduced her idea in clay to make a set of colourful drinking vessels.

Sarah presented one of the mugs to Coun Saynor.

Louise Turner, spokeswoman for the Environment Agency, said: "We are delighted to be able to give the community of Stamford Bridge the comfort of knowing that they don't have to worry about watching the river levels every time it rains.

"Crucially the defences will protect the main road from flooding, which means that many more people will benefit from access to and from the village.

"The partly-completed defences were tested this summer and they were able to stand up to the risk at that time. Now they're fully completed, the defences will protect the community against a flood of a similar

size to that experienced in the area in autumn 2000."

Roy Ward, chairman of the Yorkshire Regional Flood Defence Committee, said he was delighted with the flood defences as they would bring "major long-term benefits to the community of Stamford Bridge".

Coun Saynor said it was going to be "a great relief to the village not to have water flooding through the middle".

Updated: 09:47 Saturday, October 30, 2004