Rower turned MP backs call for sewage crackdown

A record-breaking ocean rower and MP has backed a Liberal Democrat proposal for a new Clean Water Authority (CWA) in an attempt to clean up the "disgusting" state of the country's waterways.

South Cotswolds MP Roz Savage urged her party to "go further" on its sewage policy at its autumn conference being held in Brighton.

Dr Savage holds two Guinness World Records for becoming the first woman to row across two and then three oceans solo and for the longest ocean row by a solo female.

She said a proposal to replace Ofwat with the new regulatory body could "lead the transformation of water companies into public benefit companies".

'Strong kinship'

The Lib Dems said the CWA could set legally binding targets to prevent sewage discharges into bathing waters and highly sensitive nature sites by 2030.

Speaking at the conference, Dr Savage said safely swimming in a river "should be possible without noticing you're swimming alongside something really disgusting or fearing that you or your pets are going to get sick as a result".

"We shouldn't have people's homes and farmland being flooded with sewage," she said.

"The Thames rises in my constituency, so I feel a very strong kinship with the River Thames.

"It's where I first learned to row and I've lived in many different places along the course of the river."

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