As readers will be aware, I have been at the forefront of the campaign to clean up our rivers in recent years. But when I was researching the problem for my Private Members Bill, I was hampered by a lack of data on the quality of water in our rivers.

So the Environmental Audit Committee set out to get to the bottom of this issue through an inquiry, and last week, published our report into Water Quality in Rivers, laying bare the shocking scale of the challenge.

Only 14% of English rivers meet good ecological status, with pollution from agriculture, sewage, roads and single-use plastics contributing to a dangerous ‘chemical cocktail’ coursing through our waterways.

There is now real public desire to sort this problem out. But lack of publicly available data has been an issue, which has hampered the ability to monitor water quality in rivers and detect permit breaches or pollution incidents, in turn limiting successful enforcement by the Environment Agency.

Technology is coming to our aid in enabling monitoring in real time, which the Environment Act will require to become available to inform the public. Having arranged a pollution monitoring trial project in the River Teme, I know it can be done. I am keen to do more, as I successfully encouraged Severn Trent Water to nominate the Teme at Ludlow as one of its first sites for bathing quality water. So if anyone is interested in helping with this initiative, please get in touch.

In addition to publicly accessible information, our Committee has called for at least one widely used stretch of river should meet bathing quality, in each water company area, by 2025.

Sewage is not the only issue. Intensive livestock and poultry farming is putting enormous pressure on particular catchments, such as the River Wye. We called for limits on new intensive units where catchments are already under pressure from excess nutrient load.

Fats, oils and greases, and cleaning and hygiene products containing plastic, are also causing huge problems for drainage systems when poured away in sinks or flushed down the toilet. I am supporting two Private Members Bills, one to require filters to remove plastic microfibres being flushed away from clothes washing machines, and another to prohibit the manufacture and sale of single use cleaning and hygiene products containing plastic, in particular wet wipes, which do not biodegrade.  

A problem of this scale is not fixed overnight, but I shall keep campaigning until our rivers are restored to the arteries of nature and safe for the public to enjoy.