In a joint statement, the three politicians accused the UK of neglecting its environmental commitments as the sewage polluted the waters of the English Channel and the North Sea. “We cannot tolerate the environment, the economic activity of our fishermen and the health of our citizens being put at risk by the UK’s repeated negligence in managing its wastewater,” said Stéphanie Yon-Courtin, member. of the Fisheries Commission of the European Union and one of the signatories of the declaration. “The Channel and the North Sea are not dumping grounds.” Nathalie Loiseau, another of the politicians and chair of the delegation to the EU-UK partnership parliamentary assembly, said the UK had breached the principle of “non-regression” on the levels of environmental protection agreed in the EU-UK trade deal and called for response from the European Commission. “Since leaving the European Union, the UK has ignored environmental requirements regarding the quality of its water,” the three politicians said in the statement. “However, as a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and a party to the Trade and Cooperation Agreement [with the EU]the UK is committed to protecting the seas that surround it and that we share.” Caroline Lucas, the Greens MP for Brighton Pavillion, said the sewage scandal showed “that our government’s persistent neglect of our natural environment is now further damaging our reputation abroad”. “Our government has taken a wrecking ball to the health and well-being of the natural world in general,” he told the Independent. “If we want to restore our precious waterways for generations to come, this lame-duck government has to go.” Alex Sobell, Labour’s shadow minister for nature recovery and the domestic environment, said it was “no surprise” that other countries were starting to notice the “stink”. “Tory ministers have failed to stop water companies ruining family summers and hitting resort businesses, with beach closures, polluted rivers and toxic lakes this bank holiday weekend,” he told the Independent. All three French politicians are members of President Emmanuel Macron’s La Republique En Marche party. The statement follows public warnings in the UK of pollution at more than 50 beaches after companies dumped sewage into the sea and after new figures revealed sewage has been pumped into the environment in England and Wales more than a million times in recent years five years. Between 2016 and 2021, sewage was spilled at least 1,261,498 times in the two countries, according to Environment Agency figures obtained through a freedom of information request by the Labor Party. Last year, on average, a spill lasted more than seven hours. Paul de Zylva, a Friends of the Earth campaigner, said “pollution knows no borders”. “If the UK is to avoid being labeled ‘Europe’s Dirty Man’ again, the Government must keep this commitment and do much more to prevent sewage from polluting our seas and waterways,” he said. “Our European neighbors are right to be concerned – and could explore legal avenues to force the UK to honor its international commitments.” A Defra spokesman said: “It is not true that we have been exempted from strict water quality targets. The Environment Act has made our water quality laws even stronger than when we were in the EU, from targets to tackle nutrient pollution to new powers to tackle harmful substances in our waters. “We also legislated for water utilities to reduce the frequency and volume of storm overflow discharges and legislated for water utilities to install new monitors to report real-time sewage discharges in their area.” Tim McPhee, a spokesman for the European Commission, said three French MEPs sent a letter to Virginijus Sinkevičius, the European Union’s Environment, Oceans and Fisheries Commissioner, on Wednesday. The letter has been received and will be answered in due course, he said. The Commission has yet to make contact with the UK authorities and said there is nothing concrete about stormwater overflows under the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement, he added.
