A group of anglers trying to restore the ecosystem of a river have seen off a challenge by the environment secretary, Steve Reed, who claimed that cleaning up the waterway was administratively unworkable.
Reed pursued an appeal against a group of anglers from North Yorkshire, who had won a legal case arguing that the government and the Environment Agency’s plans to clean up the Upper Costa Beck, a former trout stream devastated by sewage pollution and runoff, were so vague they were ineffectual.
The environment secretary decided, after Labour won the election last year, to continue the challenge, which had begun under the previous Conservative government.
On Wednesday, the appeal court found in favour of the anglers, the Pickering Fishery Association.
The judges dismissed Reed’s argument that it was administratively unworkable to develop specific measures to clean up individual rivers, lakes and streams as is required by law under the water framework directive – legislation that aims to improve the quality of rivers, lakes and coastal waters.
Andrew Kelton, a solicitor from Fish Legal, which represented the anglers, said: “This case goes to the heart of why the government has failed to make progress towards improving the health of rivers and lakes in England.
“Only 16% of waterbodies – 14% of rivers – are currently achieving ‘good ecological status’, with no improvement for at least a decade, which comes as no surprise to us having seen how the Environment Agency at first proposed, but then for some reason failed to follow through with, the tough action needed against polluters in this case.”
He said the Upper Costa Beck was just one of 4,929 waterbodies, but was a case study in regulatory inaction in the face of evidence of declining river health.
The Costa Beck has failed to achieve good ecological status under the water framework directive regulations partly because of sewage pollution and runoff from farms.
The anglers, who have spent more than 10 years trying to get the authorities to clean up the river, took the government and the EA to court in an attempt to force action. They successfully argued that the plan by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the EA to improve the stream lacked the legally required measures necessary to restore it – for example, it did not include the tightening of discharge permits for sewage treatment works.
The judge in the high court found that the government had unlawfully failed to assess and identify specific measures to achieve the legally mandatory targets for the waterbody. That ruling was on Wednesday upheld by the appeal court.
Penelope Gane, the head of practice at Fish Legal, said Reed could show a real commitment to restoring rivers and lakes. “What we need is meaningful action to clean up rivers,” she said. “Anything short of that will be a tacit admission that the government has abandoned its environmental ambitions for water.”
Defra has been approached for comment.
