Green Alliance calls out risk to WFD in Brexit water policy stocktake

Whether the Government keeps or weakens the Water Framework Directive (WFD) is the biggest unanswered water policy question and the test by which the administration should be judged on its commitment to restoring water health.

That’s according to a stocktake from Green Alliance, authored by Ali Morse, water policy manager for The Wildlife Trusts, on Progress since Brexit on the water environment.

The UK kept the WFD approach via regulations on exiting the EU, but developments since raise questions about the future. The report said: “While a potential government response is one of greater action and perhaps even ratcheting up of ambition, there is a lurking concern that the government may instead opt for a ‘simplification’ of targets. This would make them easier to meet and would conveniently ensure that the state of the water environment no longer presents a barrier to ambitions of housing development and economic growth.”

The report covered the following UK developments since Brexit: 

• Sewage crisis – In response to public outrage, 10% of AMP8’s £104bn spend has been committed to reduce harm from storm overflows, on a path to spill eradication by 2050. This has split opinion, with some lamenting the slow pace and others questioning the value “considering the relatively low levels of harm that storm overflows are causing relative to other pressures upon the water environment”. 

• WFD – These other pressures are exposed by the holistic nature of the WFD, which focuses on  ecological health. The UK is miles off the 2027 target (only 16% of English water bodies are in good ecological health and none in good chemical health), due to a complex mix of pressures and sectoral impacts. But the UK is not alone. Across EU member states, 60.5% of surface water bodies fail to achieve good ecological status, and 73.2% fail to achieve good chemical status. However, paths now appear to be diverging. The EU’s European Water Resilience Strategy is rooted in WFD principles, with added forward focus on nutrient pollution, forever chemicals and water scarcity. In England, the Environment Act 2021 sought to drive WFD progress in agricultural pollution, treated wastewater, water use and pollution from abandoned metal mines. But alone it would not result in full compliance with relevant WFD objectives and does not cover all of the areas where progress is needed, such as urban pollution, chemicals, invasive species and other issues.

• In other policy areas including PFAS, invasive non-native species and bathing waters, the Green Alliance report considered the UK approach is failing to keep pace with European developments. 

• Labour Government actions – Since coming to power, key actions have included the Water Special Measures Act and the commissioning of the Cunliffe Review. On the latter’s recommendations, the report highlighted many welcome aspects, including for a cross-sectoral water strategy and the introduction of regional systems planning. It found other aspects “could be harmful if not implemented well, but which have scope to ensure positive changes if done carefully” – including the formation of a single regulator which “could see a focus on water companies at the expense of other issues, and risks nature considerations being lost amongst economic priorities”. But according to Morse, the biggest risk comes from the recommendation that ‘UK and Welsh governments should review the current water legislative framework and amend it accordingly’.

The report concluded: “More details on these proposals and others will follow, but the biggest unanswered question remains the fate of the overarching legislative framework under which all of this will operate. This is the test that will determine whether the government is committed to restoring the country’s rivers, lakes and seas, or whether the changes described above will merely distract from a quiet weakening of the framework, targets and ambition. The battle to bring these waters back to life is far from over.”