The state of our waterways is a national scandal.
In England, 86% of rivers are officially degraded. That’s according to the Environment Agency’s own assessments, not ours.
With a group of Yorkshire anglers, Fish Legal took the last Government to court over its failure to make more progress towards restoring rivers and lakes across the country.
We said their River Basin Management Plans were defective. We said the Government had misunderstood and misapplied the law. And we said they needed to commit to specific actions to restore every river and lake nationwide, not just some - and quickly to meet legally binding targets by 2027.
The High Court agreed. The last Government got it wrong.
But instead of accepting that, before the general election, they applied to appeal the Court’s judgment...
The Appeal
What started as a local fight to restore one spring-fed beck near Pickering became a test case for restoring rivers and lakes across the country.
This new Government had a chance to get it right. They came into power promising to take “action to accelerate progress on improving the water environment” and to make “cleaning up the water environment a priority for Defra”.
They could have accepted the High Court’s ruling and dropped the appeal. They could have directed the Environment Agency to get on with its job of regulating industries that are polluting rivers up and down the country. Instead, they have chosen to defend and continue the previous Government’s failure.
So we’re heading to the Court of Appeal to force this Government to ACT NOW to deliver for our rivers.
To do this, we need your help
If, like us, you want to see all rivers thriving with life; if you’ve had enough of empty words and spin over substance; of excuses for inaction and endless bureaucratic drift – back us in our legal fight in the Court of Appeal.
14% of rivers in good condition is not good enough.
We don’t think any river should be left behind, because #EveryRiverCounts
The date: Court of Appeal 14 and 15 January 2025
The Appellants are the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Minister Steve Reed) and the Environment Agency (CEO Philip Duffy).
Fish Legal is representing the respondents - Pickering Fishery Association. External Counsel David Wolfe KC and Raj Desai are instructed.
We did not crowdfund for the case in the High Court. But when giving permission for the appeal, the High Court Judge acknowledged that anglers were bringing this case in the public interest.
We need to raise funds to defend the appeal.
Please support us.
“We never thought that our angling club would be at the centre of a nationally important legal case. But it is now obvious that the Environment Agency’s reluctance to tackle chronic pollution from a water company and other business on the Costa Beck is the same across the country. Our club is determined to fight on, not just for the sake of our local river but for every threatened river in the country which, as the Judge acknowledged, is in the public interest.” Martin Smith, Secretary Pickering Fishery Association
“This case goes to the heart of why Government has failed to make progress towards improving the health of rivers and lakes in England. The Environment Agency and the Government have taken a deliberately high-level, generic – and effectively non-committal – approach to achieving the restoration targets when what was needed was a determined, waterbody-by-waterbody plan of real action to stop the damage.” Andrew Kelton, Fish Legal Solicitor
“What we need are River Basin Management Plans backed by meaningful action. Anything short of that will be a tacit admission that the Government has abandoned its environmental ambitions for water.” Penelope Gane, Head of Practice at Fish Legal
- Sign the petition today: #EveryRiverCounts
About us:
Fish Legal, based at Leominster, Herefordshire, is a not-for-profit organisation of dedicated lawyers who use the law on behalf of anglers to fight polluters and others who damage or threaten the water environment. Fish Legal is a unique, membership association and everything its lawyers do is funded collectively by members' subscriptions, donations and legacies.