Exclusive in the Guardian “Water firms discharged raw sewage into England’s rivers 200,000 times in 2019”

Newspaper highlights how untreated effluent flowed into waterways for more than 1.5m hours, whilst England’s privatised water firms have paid £57bn in dividends since 1991.

Water companies in England discharged raw sewage into rivers on more than 200,000 occasions last year, according to data obtained by the Guardian.

The analysis reveals untreated human waste was released into streams and rivers for more than 1.5m hours in 2019.

The figures, obtained via environmental information requests, trace releases of sewage from storm drains in rivers across England by all nine water companies and provide a comprehensive picture of the scale of pollution from what critics say is the routine dumping of untreated sewage.

Popular English rivers including the Thames, the Windrush, which runs through the Cotswolds and Oxfordshire, the River Chess, a chalk stream in Buckinghamshire, the Avon in Bristol, the Severn, and the River Wharfe in Ilkley are among the many affected.

Read more here.

Also in the Guardian

Revealed: raw sewage poured into Olympic Park wildlife haven