All the 700 or so residents in a small South Yorkshire village have been told to evacuate their homes, as a seventh “danger to life” flood warning was issued on Saturday morning.

The latest warning was declared by the Environment Agency (EA) for the village of Fishlake, just north of Doncaster at around 1am, after a prolonged period of “biblical” rain fell on the River Don.

It came hours before Robert Jenrick, the Housing Minister, announced that the Government is triggering its emergency Bellwin scheme to fund the cost of tackling floods in Yorkshire, Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire.

Under the initiative, councils who pay for items such as temporary accommodation or staff overtime in response to floods are eligible to have the full costs reimbursed by the government.

River levels in the village, of around 200 properties, have surpassed their highest recorded level twice in under a fortnight.

Levels in the River Don have exceeded six metres, which is higher than its point during the catastrophic 2007 floods, in which two people died in Milhouses and the Wicker.