The government is planning to consult on expanding its targets to
tackle sewage even further to cover all coasts, estuaries and
marine protected sites, Defra has confirmed today (9 May 2023).
The Storm
Overflows Discharge Reduction Plan, published in August 2022,
set out stringent targets to protect people and the environment,
backed up by £56 billion capital investment – the largest
infrastructure programme in water company history.
Since then, the government has continued to drive action to hold
water companies to account, bring in tougher regulation and
accelerate infrastructure to tackle pollution. Building on the
measures in the plan to address the overflows causing the most
harm first, the government is now planning to consult to expand
the targets to cover all coastal and estuarine overflows.
It follows last month’s announcement that the
government’s target to reduce storm overflows will be enshrined
in law through the Environment Act 2021. This will be backed
by separate interim milestones for bathing waters and high
priority nature sites.
The government has always been clear that it will go further and
faster to tackle the issue of storm overflows wherever possible,
with Environment Secretary Thérèse Coffey demanding earlier this
year that water
companies share individual improvement plans on all storm
overflows by June.
The targets outlined in the Storm Overflows Discharge Reduction
Plan provide an achievable, credible route to tackling sewage and
delivering the improvements customers expect without
disproportionately impacting consumer bills.
Environment Secretary Thérèse Coffey said:
As a coastal MP myself, I know that our coastlines are hugely
important to local communities and to nature. While 93% of
our beaches with designated bathing status are already rated
excellent or good, I intend to use my powers to better protect
all of our coasts and estuaries”.
The Plan for
Water set out the government’s strategy to tackle all sources
of pollution – not just storm overflows, but also agriculture,
plastics, road run-off and chemicals – as well as managing the
pressures on our water resources.
This announcement comes as Ofwat sets out new measures that will
make it more likely that companies will face higher penalties if
they do not fully monitor their storm overflows, on top of the
sanctions the Environment Agency already has.
Further information
The Government is taking action to clean up our water through
more investment, stronger regulation and tougher enforcement on
those who pollute.
Measures include:More
investment
- £1.6 billion of accelerated investment by water companies, to
spend on new infrastructure to tackle pollution and increase our
water resilience – including £1.1 billion on storm overflow
improvements to cut 10,000 discharges
- Creating a new Water Restoration Fund, using money from water
company finesand penalties to support local environmental
projects
- More than doubling the money for slurry infrastructure by
increasing funding to £34 million for farmers to improve slurry
storage, reducing a major source of water pollution
- Supporting farmers to store more water on their land through
the £10 million Water Management Grant to fund more on-farm
reservoirs and better irrigation equipment.
Stronger regulation
- Consulting on banning the sale of plastic wet wipes
- Enabling key water supply infrastructure – such as reservoirs
and water transfer schemes – to be built more quickly
- Bringing forward the deadline for water companies to reduce
chemicals in wastewater treatment to 2027
- Consulting on extending environmental permits to cover dairy
and intensive beef farms, and to improve how this is done for pig
and poultry farms, in order to better manage sources of pollution
Tougher enforcement
- Consulting on unlimited fines for polluting water companies
- Supporting Ofwat action to link dividends to company
performance, and tightening up measures on water bosses’ bonuses