, Columnist
The Stink Over Britain’s Sewage
Forget renationalizing water companies. The Tories need to do a better job regulating them.
The new sewer under the Thames can’t come soon enough.
Photographer: Bloomberg/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
August is prime time for enjoying Britain’s rivers and coastal areas, but not so much this year. Pristine waterways have been polluted with raw sewage, yielding photos of gray-brown sludge andthousands of dead fish killed by toxic waste. It’s a brave person who orders oysters right now.
There is nothing new about the twin problems that have been making headlines lately — water leakages and sewage dumps. But heavy rainfall after a period of drought led to overflows from a system that wasn’t built for either today’s population size or the effect of dramatic climate change.