Our rivers in the United Kingdom are under increasing external pressures, some of these from changing weather patterns and a number attributable to our growing population. Over abstraction has been a key matter highlighted over recent years, and now the extent of raw sewage discharge (legal and illegal) has been brought to the fore.
Some of you may have watched the recent BBC Panorama programme that looked into the dumping of raw sewage into our waterways by the water companies. If you missed it you can watch it HERE.
The key take aways from the programme was not that the water companies are allowed to dump raw sewage, this is a saftey messure in periods of extreme wet weather. It was the amount of times, and volume of discharging that happened outside of the permitted times with virtually no checks or penalties for doing so. Thus causing untold damage to our precious waterways.
There are of course a number of ways to get involved including the following links:
Anglers Against Pollution; Set up by the Angling Trust, this is a campaign designed to unite the angling community as one voice for the protection and improvement of our rivers, lakes and streams.
Petition; Ban Water Companies discharging raw sewage into water courses. This petition was set up after the BBC Panorama programme and designed to get the topic on raw sewage discharge considered for debate in Parliament.