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London Mayor must tackle ‘mounting sewage crisis’

Alice Roberts
By Alice Roberts
21st January 2025

We have written to the Mayor of London urging him to create a dedicated Sewer Connections Action Team (SCAT) to tackle the mounting crisis of river pollution resulting from misconnections in the capital’s sewer system.

London’s waterways are struggling. All 41 rivers in the city are polluted. A third of London’s sewer network is unmapped. Meanwhile, raw sewage continues to flow into the city’s streams and rivers through ‘misconnected’ pipes.

The long-awaited Thames Tideway (or ‘Super Sewer’) has been touted as the solution to London’s sewage woes. However, campaigners warn that without decisive action to fix misconnected pipes, it will only ever partially solve the problem. This is because misconnected pipes enable sewage to evade treatment and enter waterways directly.

Local councils are responsible for addressing misconnections by requiring property owners to make necessary repairs. Yet, in many cases, these issues remain unresolved, enabling sewage to pour into rivers for years.

Alice Roberts of CPRE London, said: “Clearly, the current system is not working. We have a mounting sewage crisis. This is why we are calling for the formation of a central team that can work on behalf of all London boroughs. Doing so will offer a more efficient system that can actually deliver on enforcement and eliminate the flow of sewage into local water systems.”

Join the campaign! Together, we can hold the Mayor accountable and push for a cleaner, healthier future for our waterways. Support the campaign to end sewage pollution.  Please email Sadiq Khan at mayor@london.gov.uk asking him to set up a Sewer Connections Action Team! You can find a copy of the letter we sent him below, but we encourage you to personalise your letter with your own wording.

Our letter to London Mayor Sadiq Khan 21 Jan 2025

Find out more

Webinar from 23 January 2025

See the presentations from the event.