River Pollution

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

Wednesday 16th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

The noble Baroness makes an extremely important point. The department is actively looking at what more we can do using the new Nature4Climate Fund and the transition from CAP to ELM to incentivise a much higher standard of management either side of waterways throughout the country. I hope that on the back of that we will be able to produce a compelling programme.

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, according to studies by Greenpeace and Manchester University, microplastic contamination, which brings an array of biodiversity problems to our waterways, is

“pervasive on all river channel beds.”

The UK banning microbeads is a step in the right direction, but only a drop in the ocean. What measures are the Government considering to prevent this and to clear the existing contamination of plastics, preferably before they break down into microplastics—or, worse, nanoplastics—en route to the sea?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

Chemicals come from almost all human activities. Much chemical pollution comes from domestic properties—for example, detergents, which go into the sewers—and that is going to continue as long as those chemicals are permissible to use. Particularly damaging chemicals such as mercury are priorities for international action and their use is now regulated or banned. Defra is looking very closely at microplastic pollution in the environment, specifically the water environment, and its work will inform the development of policies to mitigate it and to build on the recent microbead ban, which we introduced last year.