Water Pollution in London

Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Morning. The regular release of untreated sewerage into our rivers by water companies is a scandal, and it cannot continue. Neither I, the Greater London Authority (GLA), or boroughs have any powers over sewer discharge in our waterways. I have written again to the Thames Water’s Chief Executive and my team have met with him to be absolutely clear that continued inaction will not be tolerated. London’s rivers are the arteries of our city and Londoners deserve action to clean them up. The target the Member refers to is a Thames Water commitment set out in their Pollution Incident Reduction Plan. It is not correct to suggest it is a commitment I have made as Mayor. The Thames Water 2025 targets were monitored by the GLA over a two-year period. Thames Water reported that around £1.3 billion of investment had been made in London from April 2020 to September 2022, but despite this investment and its commitment to improvements, pollution incidents did not decrease, they increased. Thames Water’s most recent river health report [Improving river health in the River Thames catchment, April 2024], published last month, showed that there were a similar number of pollution incidents in 2023 as 2022. This is an appalling and unacceptable situation. It is obvious Thames Water needs to do much more to turn its record around and start taking proper care of our waterways.

The body responsible for regulation for the privatised water and sewage industry is Water Services Regulation Authority (Ofwat). It is Ofwat’s job to hold Thames Water to account. Earlier this year, I called on Ministers to stop turning a blind eye to the pollution in our rivers, demanding they introduce tougher penalties for water companies that pollute. In the absence of national Government action, I am launching an ambitious plan to make rivers in London swimmable within a decade, cleaning our rivers for nature and in turn opening up more swimmable, open spaces for Londoners where suitable and safe. While I do not have the power or resources to rectify this dire situation on my own, I have asked my officers start working on a collaborative plan to drive forward action in this area, marking out the work needed over the coming years to clean our waterways and restore river health and water quality, while also taking short-term wins where we can.

Hina Bokhari AM: OK, thank you. It sounds like that the target of 2025 is not going to be met because of many reasons that you have just laid out, but the Government has had a shocking record on sewage in our rivers. But considering your limited powers, as you just said, you did make a commitment in your manifesto with very little detail to make London’s water swimmable within ten years. What specific actions have you got in place to make rivers swimmable? How are you going to monitor the progress, and will you swim in the Thames once it is clean and safe?

Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Colleagues can already take advantage of swimming in the Thames outside City Hall in the Royal Docks. As I said in the answer to my question, I have asked colleagues in City Hall to draw up how we can work together, working with the fantastic environmental campaigners, working with boroughs, working with the Government, the Environment Agency (EA), Ofwat, and others to do what we can to make the river swimmable. We already know the progress we made in relation to the difference beavers in London makes in relation to building dams, river reeds in relation to reducing pollution, and other policies as well. We will be setting out how we are going to get to a cleaner river. The good news is we have shown in the past that we can clean the air and I am sure we will make progress in cleaning the river as well.

Hina Bokhari AM: You have talked again about the lack of power and that Copenhagen and Paris have greatly improved their waterways because they have devolved powers for water supply and sanitation. Will you support and lobby the next Government to implement such a model?

Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Of course, we are going to lobby the next Government to devolve more powers and resources to London. That includes in all areas. One of the frustrations we have of course is Thames Water is responsible for a lot of the problems that we are trying to seek to address. We are going to obviously fix the problem at source in relation to the problems Thames Water is having. Like you said, there is a separate issue about cleaning up the river as well, we want to do both. What we do not want to do is a situation where, on the one hand we have a great plan and we are making progress cleaning up the river, but there is still sewage being discharged into the River Thames and other rivers across our great city.

Hina Bokhari AM: OK, well, the major contributing factor to water pollution across London is missed connections where plumbing connects to surface run-off sewers instead of waste water sewers. There are currently 943 identified misconnections in London, but some boroughs perform better than others in identifying those misconnections and forcing action. Will you use your convening powers to ensure best practices on tackling misconnections are being shared throughout London?

Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Yes, a particular issue in inner and outer London, less so in central London, but we are trying to make sure that Thames Water understands the consequences of doing so. You are spot on to recognise this as one of the factors which can be rectified.

Hina Bokhari AM: OK, thank you very much, Mr Mayor. Lots still to do to make sure that our rivers are clean, but I am sure that, if we are pushing for more devolved powers, from your perspective I think we will be able to see some progress there. I would like to see a comparative way of the way they are working in Paris and Copenhagen, here in London too. Thank you.