+44 (0)1279 600 440
Environmental Innovations
Environmental Innovations
  • Home
  • About
  • Products & Services
    • Overviews
      • Spill, Firewater, CSO and In-Drain Containment
      • Flood and Blocked Sewer detection, and mitigation solutions
      • Complete Interceptor and Separator Systems, from tank to monitoring
      • Wireless and Remote links, sensors and alarms
    • Solutions
      • The Flapstopper
      • The Drainstopper
      • The Telestopper
      • Flood Warning Systems and Alarm
      • Blocked Sewer Detection
      • Vertical Stack Block Sewer Detection
      • Interceptor Alarms
      • Basic Oil Interceptor Alarm
      • Fully Integrated Oil Interceptor Alarm
      • Bypass Interceptor
      • Full Retention Oil Interceptor
      • Drainage and CCTV Surveys
    • Wireless
      • Wireless Call Point
      • Wireless and Remote links, sensors and alarms
      • Industrial Kitchen Blocked Sewer Sentinel
      • Wireless Link Transmitter
  • Servicing & Installation
  • Blog
  • Contact
Menu back  

Containment News September 2015: ‘PM Swims in Sewage’

September 8, 2015Leave a commentUncategorizedBy enviro

PM Swims in Sewage

The full edition of September’s containment news is available here with all of the news, stories, and live links: *Containment News September 2015 PDF Version*

 

‘PM Swims in Sewage’

I’ve commented before on the woeful lack of coverage of water related pollution and sewage incidents in the national media. Therefore it is left to the small local newspapers to campaign and highlight the problem.  In many cases there is even an apparent desire to play down the issue. On the 23rd August the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph ran the story that  “British beaches that have been rated cleaner than ever could be blacklisted as being unsafe for bathing due to new EU rules.”  They went on to report that “up to 25 beaches in England will be blacklisted under the new guidelines and will have to put up signs warning against bathing by next May.”  Far from welcoming the stricter rules which aim to make our bathing waters safer, the Telegraph and Mail’s stance was firmly in the ‘keep your nose out Brussels’ tradition.  However, less than a week later the same newspapers were tub-thumping that “untreated human waste was [being] pumped into the sea”.

This dramatic turnaround in attention was due to the fact that Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife “swims in sewage” and had been “surfing in sea containing diluted sewage during a holiday in Cornwall” 48 hours after a spill.  The ‘celebrity’ angle briefly elevated sewage pollution to blanket coverage in all of the UK’s national press as if beach contamination was breaking news.  Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) who have been tirelessly campaigning on the issue since 1990 must have taken more incoming calls from the national media in a day than they would normally receive in a decade.  A sad indictment on what drives the media’s attention, and presumably as it’s all about selling papers a reflection on what the general public are interested in reading.

Now that the 24 hour newsworthiness of sewage incidents has passed, the UK’s 31,000 Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs) will return largely to media obscurity.  It’s not just the press who will shift their focus, between the end of September and the 15th May next year the monitoring of sewage beach spills will take a rest because that period falls outside the ‘bathing season’.  Those fool-hardy recreational beach users who insist on using our coastal waters ‘out of season’ must hope that the Prime Minister has caught the surfing bug (no not that one!) and starts to surf all year round too.  Perhaps then the media will wake-up and smell the sewage and water companies will be forced to confront the fact that using our coastal waters as a dumping ground every time we have a heavy downpour of rain is something which has no place in the 21st Century, in or out of the ‘bathing season’.

 

Phil Bremner

Editor:  Containment News, Flood News, Wireless eNews & LPRA eNews  CONTACT

Containment News September 2015

Containment News September 2015 PDF Version

CSO'senvironment agencypollution in the mediapollution prevention guidelinessewage incidentSurfers Against Sewagewater framework directivewater pollution
About the author

enviro

Related posts
Pollution Containment Device
Box Valve Automated PCD Installed at the UK’s First EV Battery Recycling Plant
February 11, 2021
Bonfire of Environmental Regulations
Containment News July 2016: ‘Bonfire of Environmental Legislation’
July 23, 2016
Brexit Environmental Impacts
Containment News June 2016: ‘Environmental Impacts of Brexit’
June 16, 2016
Pollution Conspiracy Theory Alert
Containment News May 2016: ‘Conspiracy Theory Alert’
May 12, 2016
Surfers against sewage, sewage free seas 2016
Containment News April 2016: ‘Sewage Free Seas’
April 15, 2016
Lacklustre direction for environmental targets
Containment News March 2016: ‘Lacklustre Direction for Environmental Targets’
March 21, 2016
Leave Comment

Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

WHAT CLIENTS SAY
  • “Containment news is a great free resource, packed with the latest relevant news on environmental crimes, actions and solutions.  Subscribe now and ensure you are kept up to date with all the important environmental issues.”

    Andy Cummins – Campaign Director for Surfers Against Sewage
  • “Containment News is an informative news-feed and I’d encourage all of our Environment Officers to sign-up to it.”

     

    Paul Linster – CEO of the Environment Agency
CONTACT US
The Innovation Farm
Sawbridgeworth Road
Little hallingbury
Bishop’s Stortford
Hertfordshire
CM22 7QU
QUICK LINKS
  • Case Studies
  • FAQ's
  • Contact
  • Brochure Download
  • Environmental Regulations
CONTAINMENT NEWS
  • Box Valve Automated PCD Installed at the UK’s First EV Battery Recycling Plant
    February 11, 2021
  • Bonfire of Environmental Regulations
    Containment News July 2016: ‘Bonfire of Environmental Legislation’
    July 23, 2016
  • Brexit Environmental Impacts
    Containment News June 2016: ‘Environmental Impacts of Brexit’
    June 16, 2016
© 2015 Environmental Innovations Ltd

Website by Brilliant Ltd