National Policy Statement (Waste Water)

I accept that there would be an impact, but the use of the word ““effluent”” in relation to the 39 million cubic metres gives the public and many Members of this House a somewhat misleading impression of the sheer urgency of the need to undertake the project at this time. It has been asserted that the river has been getting better and will continue to do so, and there is no doubt about that, but a feature of debates on the Water Industry (Financial Assistance) Bill last week and less recently was the number of hon. Members who suggested that the Thames had been getting worse, and will continue to get worse without the tunnel. The hon. Members for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) and for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) made that statement in part. That claim is not supported by the facts, as regards the immediate future; it is also probably not entirely true as regards the past and present. I note that the Environment Agency's website no longer hosts a press release that it issued only 17 months ago, but at that time, it went so far as to describe the Thames as"““the beauty queen of the planet's waterways.””" That perhaps goes a little too far, even for those who have no desire whatever for a Thames tunnel-type project, but what prompted the comment was real enough: the sustained and continuing improvement of the Thames, which saw it win the international Theiss river prize for outstanding achievement in river management and restoration.