Alison Griffiths

I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s diagnosis, but I do agree that the fines need to be collected and distributed. The other issues that have been identified in my constituency—I imagine that they are wider issues, too—are illegal misconnections and cowboy builders, which we must crack down on. Without addressing those issues, we will not get the results that we need, and constituents need to know what is being done to stop them. Since being elected, I have had constructive engagement with Southern Water and the Environment Agency’s local team and head office. Having visited Ford wastewater treatment works and done a shift with the misconnections team in Bognor Regis, I know that work is being done to upgrade the network, but this issue requires a strategic, cross-agency approach—one that considers the serious impact of the Government’s continued pursuit of house building on our floodplains on flood resilience and sewage discharges. When schools in my constituency are taking children to the beach and being told that they cannot swim in the sea, it is not just disappointing; it is disgraceful. It is not the legacy that we want to leave for the next generation—we owe them better.