Stakeholders and experts group calls for statutory protection for chalk streams

The national Chalk Stream Restoration Group has called on the government to create overarching statutory protection and priority status for chalk streams and their catchments to give them a distinct identity and to drive investment in water-resources infrastructure, water treatment and catchment-scale restoration.

The call came in the Chalk Stream Restoration Strategy, just published under the wing of the Catchment Based Approach (CaBA). The strategy is the work of the Chalk Stream Restoration Group’s multi-stakeholder and expert panels, chaired by Charles Rangeley-Wilson, river restoration writer and specialist.

The strategy pointed out that seven chalk stream catchments are currently designated as sites of special scientific interest and four as special areas of conservation and “the results of their enhanced protection are obvious when you look at the investment afforded to their protection in comparison with the rest”.

It continued to say all chalk streams should have such priority: “There is a clear need for a status mechanism that can add impetus and drive investment across multiple policy levers e.g. water company price review process, ELMs, local nature recovery and Landscape Recovery strategies, Biodiversity Net Gain and protections through the local authority planning processes. It is important that this new mechanism delivers in an integrated way: chalk stream channel (water), floodplain (biodiversity) and aquifer (landscape-scale nature recovery).”

The report covers in detail the issues of restoring flow, reducing pollution and restoring physical habitat quality.