Tories seek river action beyond storm overflows

The Conservative Environment Network has published a manifesto for water featuring “six ambitious conservative policies to restore the health of the rivers, seas and waterways that have shaped and defined our country throughout its history”.

Forty MPs and peers have signed the Changing course manifesto, which urged the Government to go beyond its existing work on storm overflows through the Environment Act, to tackle agriculture, development and wider water industry pollution. It argued: “Although water quality policies have never been stronger, there is still a long way to go if we are to meet our new water quality targets and deal with all the pressures on our waterways, like agricultural runoff. There is a huge public appetite to improve the health of our water environment, and strong support for environmental protections to safeguard water quality.”

The manifesto policies are:

• create a River Restoration Fund to direct the money raised from fining illegally polluting water companies into local initiatives to tackle pollution;

• roll out the Environmental Land Management Scheme;

• introduce a clear labelling system to stop unflushables causing 300,000 sewer blocks a year;

• reform planning rules to enable reservoir building; to make water firms statutory planning consultees; and to ensure new homes have sustainable drainage;

• reform nutrient neutrality requirements currently blocking 120,000 homes across 74 local authorities by creating a private market for developers to fund catchment restoration; and

• designate at least 22 new river bathing water sites every five years to drive pollution reduction.