The target date for cleaning up England’s waterways has been pushed back… by a casual 36 years.
The Environment Agency pledged on Thursday to invest £5.3 billion to stop the further deterioration of waterways.
Not one English waterway, including rivers, lakes, estuaries and coastal waters is in good ecological and chemical health at present, with pollution from water treatment plants and agriculture the key sources of the damage.
But the summary documents within the plan reveal the target for all 3,651 water bodies to achieve good chemical and ecological status – a state in which they are as close to their natural state as possible – was now decades away in 2063.
Until Brexit, the UK government was signed up to the water framework directive, which required countries to make sure all their waters achieved “good” chemical and ecological status by 2027 at the latest.
The UK government later reduced the target to 75 per cent of waterways reaching the single test of good ecological status by 2027 at the latest.
The target for the majority of waterways to achieve good status in both chemical and ecological tests has now been pushed back to 2063, according to the documents.
By 2027, only 4 per cent of waters are currently on track to be in good overall condition.
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