Let's Fix Politics... For Our Rivers
The sewage crisis is a democratic failure, not just an environmental one
By Roz Savage MP
With summer weather (almost) here, many of us will want to be out of doors, enjoying our countryside and our rivers. But it’s hard to do that once you know what is pouring into our rivers at a disgusting rate.
A few months ago, I hosted a screening in the Houses of Parliament of Dirty Business, the Channel 4 docudrama exposing the failures of Britain’s water industry. It was uncomfortable viewing. Among those present that day was the mother of Heather Preen, the eight-year-old girl who died after contracting E. coli, probably from sewage on a beach in Devon. As we watched the harrowing reconstruction of her daughter’s final moments, there wasn’t a dry eye in the room. The film showed, with painful clarity, how a system can fail in plain sight for years — and still fail to change.
Talk to people by almost any river in Britain today and you will hear a deep, shared frustration. From wild swimmers to anglers, from farmers to families, people are asking how we allowed something so fundamental — clean water — to slip so badly out of our grasp. Rivers that should be places of life and joy have, in too many cases, become conduits for sewage.
This concern cuts across politics, geography and class. Which raises the question: if so many people agree something must change, why hasn’t it?
We tend to look first at water companies, regulators or ministers, and they all bear responsibility. But when a problem is this visible, this widespread and this persistent, we have to look deeper. This is a failure of political incentives. In a healthy democracy, sustained public concern produces sustained political pressure, and that pressure delivers change. Right now, that chain is broken.
When widespread public concern fails to translate into action, it points to a fault deeper in our democracy.
Part of the explanation lies in how we elect our governments. Under First Past the Post, power is often concentrated in a single party that may have secured less than half the vote. Millions of votes are effectively discarded. A system that sidelines millions of votes should not surprise us when it sidelines public concerns too.
The result is a winner-take-all politics of short time horizons and sharp swings, where strategies are calibrated to electoral cycles rather than decades. Long-term challenges such as water infrastructure and environmental protection do not fit easily into that model.
Cleaning up rivers requires consistent regulation, long-term investment and the willingness to take decisions whose benefits may not be fully realised for years. Yet our system rewards something quite different: headline announcements, clear dividing lines, and short-term policy making. The result is a stop-start politics in which momentum is repeatedly lost and difficult problems drift on unresolved.
This is where proportional representation becomes not just a constitutional preference, but a practical necessity. Countries with proportional systems tend to produce governments built on cooperation rather than dominance. In places such as Germany, Denmark and New Zealand, policy is negotiated across parties. The political pendulum still moves, but it does not swing so violently.
That stability matters. It allows governments to commit to long-term investment, gives regulators the confidence to enforce rules consistently, and tells companies that the rules won’t change even if the government does.
When votes are translated more fairly into seats, more voices are represented. When more voices are represented, priorities stay on the agenda. When priorities endure across election cycles, policy stabilises. And when policy stabilises, regulation strengthens and behaviour changes. That is how we get to cleaner rivers.
As Liberal Democrats, we believe in power flowing back to the people — not as a slogan, but as a principle that shapes outcomes. That means proportional representation, so every vote counts. It also means rethinking ownership. Water is not a luxury; it is a basic human need. Yet our current model has too often allowed profits to flow out while sewage flows in.
That is why we are arguing for tougher enforcement and a shift towards mutual and community ownership of water companies — models that align decision-making with the long-term interests of the people who depend on them. When power sits closer to the public, accountability becomes real.
Before entering politics, I spent years campaigning to protect our oceans — and rowing across them. Back then, my focus was saltwater. Today, it is the freshwater rivers, not always as fresh as they should be, that run through our towns and countryside.
Different waters, same lesson: when systems of power fail to reflect the will of the people, damage follows — and it persists.
The sewage crisis is not just an environmental failure. It is a democratic one. It is what happens when power is concentrated, when politics becomes short-term, and when the link between public concern and political action weakens.
We can clean up our rivers. But only if we are prepared to clean up the system that governs them.
Until power flows more cleanly, we should not be surprised that our rivers do not either.
Dr Roz Savage is the Liberal Democrat MP for South Cotswolds.
Our national survey of public attitudes towards politics is now up and running — and we want to hear what you think. Go to digitallibdems.typeform.com/fix-politics to have your say.
And if you’d like to write for us on the theme of ‘Let’s Fix Politics For…’ (… the NHS, the climate, the potholes…!) then please get in touch at libdemsforelectoralreform@gmail.com
Liberal Democrats for Electoral Reform welcome contributions from a range of voices and perspectives. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and should not be taken as the official position of LDER, the Liberal Democrats or any affiliated organisation.