Water Companies: Pollution Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Duke of Wellington
Main Page: Duke of Wellington (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)Department Debates - View all Duke of Wellington's debates with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
(2 years ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Benyon (Con)
Enormous amounts of money have been spent on new water infrastructure, but sewage companies are responsible for the maintenance and resilience of drainage and wastewater networks. To address current and future pressures on drainage networks, we are making drainage and wastewater management plans statutory through the Environment Act, so they will be consulted. They have to put these forward as a legal measure to ensure that they take into account the pressure of new housing.
The Duke of Wellington (CB)
My Lords, is the Minister aware of some analysis done by the Rivers Trust that shows that the monitoring of our rivers by the Environment Agency has much reduced in recent years? It would probably say that it does not have the resource. Could he consider either adding to its resources or at least redirecting its priorities?
Lord Benyon (Con)
We have put more money into the Environment Agency and it has been recruiting more enforcement officers to do precisely that. We are also working with citizen science. I pay tribute to the Rivers Trust and others that are providing people to assist the Environment Agency in assessing the quality of river water.