Kellie O’Gara, Salisbury Socialist Party
Water in Cambridge is reportedly 40% sewage. Thousands of fish lie dead in Swindon. British waste reaches as far as the French coast. Any wonder the obscene practice of dumping raw sewage into our waterways has come under immense scrutiny?
Over 50 UK beaches have been declared unsafe for bathing and the impact on wildlife and the environment is evident.
Sewage dumps are a so-called rare event. Yet, recently, Southern Water made four dumps in a single week and there were 373 cases of sewage discharge in 2021.
Water companies have dished out dividends to the tune of £72 billion since privatisation in 1989, rather than investing in now crumbling and leaking infrastructure.
Truss cuts
In her two years as environment secretary, Liz Truss failed to meet water bosses to deal with sewage dumping. Her £235 million cuts to the Environment Agency are credited with helping to double the instances of sewage discharge into our rivers and seas! Privatisation is a failure. Greedy bosses cannot be allowed to pollute our water for profit any longer. Unlike our water, the solution is clear. We need nationalisation under democratic working-class control – to seize their profits, and plan investment to protect our environment and reduce our bills.
