Earlier this year the leader of the Solent Protection Society’s Pollution Group, Richard Brown, wrote to his MP, Dr Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East), to express the Society’s concern and to ask what action the government was taking on Combined Sewer Overflows, given the high concentration of direct and indirect spills into the Solent water body.
Mr. Brown quoted from two recent reports that SPS has made to Parliamentary Committees examining the issues. For reference, the two reports can be read by taking the following links:
Sir Julian received a comprehensive response from the Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), Emma Hardy MP, which we felt worth bringing to the attention of our membership and the wider audience who follow SPS.
In her response, Emma Hardy MP – Parliamentary Under Secretary of State DEFRA writes:
“The government has been clear there is no excuse for poor performance, and we will not look the other way while companies routinely fail to meet agreed standards. Water companies, Iike Southern Water, must take seriously their role in meeting the public and regulators expectations….”
“I can assure you and your constituent that cleaning up England’s rivers, lakes and seas is a priority for the government. The government has taken immediate and substantial action to address the performance of water companies who are not delivering for the environment or their customers….”
“With regards to the questions on emergency maintenance works and unscheduled infrastructure failures, unfortunately we do not hold this information. Your constituent would be best placed to redirect your query to Southern Water….”
“You and your constituent may be pleased to know that The Water (Special Measures) Act (previously Bill) received Royal Assent on 24 February 2025 and will provide the most significant increase in enforcement powers for the regulators in a decade, giving them the teeth they need to take tougher action against water companies in the next investment period….”
The full response can be read at the following link: Response from Parliamentary Under Secretary of State DEFRA, Emma Hardy MP
SPS welcomes Government ambition, water company promises and improved regulatory frameworks, but the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and SPS will continue our monitoring of Solent Spills which we have done for the last 5 years.
The view of the SPS team is that the most recent data shows little improvement and what change that has occurred, both up and down, is largely the result of changes in rainfall patterns which have tended to intensify, particularly in the last two years.
The SPS Pollution team continues to work hard behind the scenes to aggregate CSO discharge data from a variety of local and local resources to keep focus on the polluted state of the Solent, its harbours and its estuaries. The increasingly positive marketing spin from Southern Water has to be carefully balanced by our own detailed observations and those of our peers in other local environmental campaigning groups. The failures in the company’s aging infrastructure witnessed in the local press probably represents the ‘tip of the iceberg’ in comparison with those which occur unreported and unresolved.
We will soon be publishing our annual detailed analysis of the EA data released in April, adding another year to our comparative picture of the state of the Solent’s CSOs.
Solent Protection Society 