Sewage pollution levels in this river are 100 times safe ‘limits’. The fight is now on to clean it up

Newcastle locals have urged the government to stop water companies pumping “disgusting” sewage into the Ouseburn river.

Sewage pollution in the waterway – which runs from near the city’s airport to the Tyne – is a staggering 100 times higher than safe standards. 

Northumbrian Water control the sewage outfall pipes along the tributary.

On Wednesday (2 October), James Cole, a Liberal Democrat city councillor in Newcastle, tabled a petition calling on the council to work with the company to “take immediate action” to end sewage overflow pollution.

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“Pretty much everyone uses the park [where the river runs]. It’s a massive green space, virtually in the city centre – it’s nice,” he told the Big Issue. “I have a good sense [the river] very important to a lot of people.”

But the Tyne tributary is very polluted. In 2022, the last year for which data exists, there were 228 raw sewage discharge incidents in the Ouseburn.

This led to some 910 million litres of contaminated water running down the river. According to a Newcastle University study published in the same year, the pollution poses a “significant risk” to health. Samples taken from eight points on the Ouseburn showed a high content of faecal bacteria from combined sewer overflows (CSOs).

The findings “consistently gave concern about the safety of people recreating in the Ouseburn”.

Under increasing pressure from local campaigners, Northumbrian Water has announced new investment. This includes £490m into “upgrading” its wastewater system by 2025 and plans to invest a further £1.7bn to “stop storm overflow spills and help improve our local environment”.

Coles welcomed the investment – but expressed cynicism regarding the water company’s motivation.

“We’ve seen national water companies behaving poorly for a long time, syphoning money for shareholder dividends instead of sorting infrastructure problems out,” he said. 

Northumbrian Water chief executive Heidi Mottram received a bonus of £234,000 in 2023/24 – up from £215,000 the previous year. Her overall pay packet rose from £781,000 to £842,000.

Meanwhile, Northumbrian water customer bills are set to increase by 11% by 2030 from £415 to £460, which is up by £45.

A spokesperson for Northumbrian Water said that the company “shares a passion” for a healthy Ouseburn.

“We have increased operational investigations and remedial works in the area and continue to work with our customers and local developers to reduce the impact of misconnections and other contributing factors to the water quality in the Ouseburn,” they said.

“To achieve these ambitions; our shareholders will be investing over £400m, and while our customers’ bills will increase, this will be by the lowest amount of any water and wastewater company.”

Coles welcomed the funding but expressed cynicism about the reasons behind the injection.

“We now get big plans and promises of record investment. I can’t help but feel the only reason they’re announcing them now is because they’ve been found out,” he said.

“It’s rainy in England. That’s not a surprise. Climate change is making it rainier. That’s not a surprise. But it seems to have come as a surprise to the water companies.”

There are limits to what local councillors can do, because regulation of the water industry is a national government responsibility.

Labour has announced the Water (Special Measures) Bill, which is designed to enhance the powers of the water regulator. Under the new law, water executives who obstruct investigations could be jailed for two or more years.

Green groups described the plans as a “useful first step” – but “you cannot enforce this without regulators”.

“Unless the Environment Agency is properly funded so that it can effectively monitor water quality and hold all polluters to account, these measures alone won’t deliver the scale of change required to get us back on track to meeting our water restoration and nature targets,” said Paul de Zylva, nature campaigner at Friends of the Earth.

On a local level, councillors must push pressure upwards, Coles added. It’s not just the Ouseburn – according to data from The Rivers Trust, 9,607 hours’ worth of sewage spills from storm overflows into Newcastle’s waterways were counted in 2023.

“Direct action at a local politics level is difficult because obviously we don’t have the power to change the law. But we have to do what we can do, which is put pressure on the national government.

“If a sufficient number of the UK’s large cities feed back, ‘Mr prime minister, the rivers going through our towns are disgusting’ – then that will have an impact.

“Newcastle is run by Labour. If they aren’t providing feedback upwards, then that’s a dereliction of duty.”

Newcastle City Council was contacted for comment.

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