Peter Hammond

@thameswater recently told me that due to “fiscal constraints”, they can’t afford to fix all of the illegal outfalls on the River Roding by 2030 (already a more than fair deadline in the circumstances I feel). This single one million pound payment to their finance chief would, alone, be enough to stop a billion litres of raw sewage a year entering the river in Ilford. Which other companies do we allow to commit serious crimes because they’ve taken money that should have been used to ensure their company complies with the law & given it to their execs instead? How long until the government says “no more” to these chancers & puts Thames Water out of its misery? news.sky.com/story/thames-wa…

Except @EnvAgency has not prosecuted a single litterer on my river, even where it’s obvious who has done it (eg a household dumping waste over their fence). The EA has also ignored serious waste crime: eg a landowner who dumped 10,000 tonnes of building waste into the river, & a huge illegal landfill site (bigger than Kidlington) beside the river near Epping, which they are planning to leave there to rot. They decided instead that the best use of their resources was to investigate & threaten to prosecute me & other volunteers for removing rubbish from the river & give me a warning not to do it again. Can you call in the EA chief exec & demand that they concentrate their resources on stopping the serious waste crimes that the public clearly wants them to concentrate on rather than hassling local volunteers?