Councillors are calling on the number of flooding statistics in the city to be released after Glasgow was drenched in torrential rain last weekend. 

The scrutiny committee had previously asked council officers for details on what the local authority had been doing to reduce the number of flooding incidents in the city and if gully cleaning schedules were frequent enough to help alleviate the issue.

A document presented to councillors informed them that Glasgow’s road network has 78,000 roadside gullies that are cleaned by the neighbourhoods, regeneration and sustainability (NRS) team at Gartcraig Depot.

NRS has also developed a risk based approach for each of the 56 neighbourhoods based on the total number of blocked gully and major/minor flood reports over a recent three-year period. 

During the meeting questions were raised about how many flooding incidents there had been in Glasgow recently.  Labour Councillor Jill Piedgeon said: “In terms of the flooding statistics, I appreciate the answer that has been given here around the gully cleaning. 

“Have we got any actual statistics on the number of incidents that have been called in to actually look at the gully cleansing process that is in place and the effect that it is having around the city.

“I am aware that we can’t control the weather but I would be interested to see the amount of instances that there have been and the number of instances that are reported.”

A council officer confirmed that they would take the questions away and get a response from colleagues ahead of the next scrutiny meeting. 

Bailie Roza Salih said: “We are all very interested in the gullies and how the drainage can be unblocked. 

“How many machines do we have to unblock these gullies and drainages in Glasgow City Council. It just seems like we have had so much flooding recently and most of the drainage is blocked and that is what is causing the issues.

“Even the leaves on the streets are going into the drains which leads to them being blocked.  “So how many resources do we have to actually unblock the gullies?”

A council officer told members that there were five large gully vehicles and the opportunity to hire additional cleansing vehicles and equipment during severe weather.

NRS has now been requested to bring back an assessment of the flood risk in Glasgow which will include the capacity of the storm drain system as well as the gullies.