Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of (a) sewage and (b) other contaminants in the river system on the food chain.

The Government's Storm Overflows Discharge Reduction Plan (SODRP) was extended in 2023 with further stringent targets on the use of storm overflows to protect people and the environment, prioritising for early action areas used for bathing, for growing shellfish, or with high ecological importance.

This plan will eliminate ecological harm from all storm sewage discharges by 2050, protecting biodiversity the ecology of our rivers and seas, and the public health of our water users for generations to come. In addition to the formulation of the SODRP, we produced an impact assessment which assesses the quality of evidence regarding environmental, public health and social impacts of storm overflow operation.

The SODRP targets will be reviewed in 2027 when new information is available to see if water companies can go further or faster.