Member

This amendment is not a very elegant one, but it was a useful way of simply raising this issue. It covers only emergency overflows, but it serves the purpose of raising the overall profile of what is an emerging problem. There needs to be a much more structured and risk-led assessment of what is monitored, where, for what purpose and how frequently. The Environment Agency’s monitoring programme has been reduced to the point where the state of the water environment is not known in sufficient detail to inform improvements needed to meet the water framework directive and other obligations. It also needs to recognise that many contaminants of concern—not least microplastics—are contained in road run-off and few of the thousands of highways outfalls are monitored or even have rudimentary treatment.