France blames Brexit over ‘unacceptable’ sewage as it accuses UK of endangering waters

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French MEPs are urging the EU Commission to take measures to end British discharges of raw sewage into shared waters, part of what they say is an unacceptable lowering of environmental standards since Brexit.

The three leading French members of the European Parliament said in a letter to EU Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius dated Wednesday that they feared harm to marine biodiversity and activities of the fish and shellfish sector.

The MEPs, fishing committee chief Pierre Karleskind, committee member Stephanie Yon-Courtin, who is also a member of the Normandy regional council, and former French minister Nathalie Loiseau referred to media reports last week about large-scale pumping of sewage into Britain’s seas.

“We cannot let the environment, the economic activity of our fishermen and the health of citizens be seriously endangered by the repeated negligence of the United Kingdom in the management of its wastewater,” Ms Yon-Courtin said in a press release.

She added: “The Channel and the North Sea are not dumping grounds.”

Britain, the MEPs said, was no longer subject to EU environmental rules after leaving the bloc, and had chosen to cut its water quality standards despite being a signatory to the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea, which contains provisions on environmental protection.

“This is unacceptable,” they wrote.

“We ask the Commission to use all political and legal means in its possession to end the situation.”

British water treatment facilities temporarily discharge raw sewage into seas and rivers if they are inundated by heavy rainfall and risk flooding.

Environmental campaigners say such discharges are becoming more common.

England and Wales regulator Ofwat and the British government’s Environment Agency have launched investigations over the past year into several water companies that admitted they might be making unpermitted sewage discharges.

Data from campaign group Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) shows 654 alerts of sewer overflows spilling sewage into bathing waters this summer, from 171 locations in England and Wales.

Last week, as heavy rain falling after weeks of dry weather overwhelmed the sewage system, there were 100 alerts for pollution, the data shows, with the south west and south coast of England worst hit.

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With rain forecast again for parts of England in the next day or so, SAS chief executive Hugo Tagholm said: “We wouldn’t be surprised if we saw more pollution events along the south coast where there’s rainfall.”

He said it did not take exceptionally heavy rainfall for raw sewage to be flushed out in storm overflows, and urged people to check the SAS Safer Seas and Rivers Service app which gives real time alerts of pollution incidents.

With the app, he said: “People are forewarned, they can make a decision to go somewhere that’s not affected, to have a good time at the beach.”

Data from the app shows the most affected areas this summer have been Longrock, Cornwall and Scarborough on the Yorkshire coast with 19 warnings each, followed by Cowes on the Isle of Wight with 16, and Spittal, Northumberland and Walney Biggar Bank in Cumbria, with 14 each.

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There has been growing public outrage in recent years at the volume of raw or partially treated sewage pumped into the UK’s rivers and coastal waters.

Mr Tagholm said sewage pollution was a public health issue and one that affected wildlife, and was linked to the climate crisis which is driving more extreme weather of very dry or wet conditions.

In the last decade, there had been a reduction in investment in sewage infrastructure in England and defunding of regulators, with water companies left in charge of self-monitoring, he said.

“We need more ambition to have clean, thriving rivers, the best bathing waters in Europe, if not the world, and make sure the water companies are investing far more of their vast profits in protecting and restoring our wild blue spaces that people rely on for their health, well-being and local economies,” he said.

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