§ Mr. MeacherTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) which bodies holding a discharge consent, other than sewage works, from the former National Rivers Authority or the Environment Agency, currently discharge pollutants under controlled permission to rivers and other water courses in England and Wales; and it he will make a statement on the current status of compliance; [40473]
(2) on how many occasions since the beginning of 1990 discharge consent conditions have applied to (a) effluent treatment plants and (b) other industrial or commercial operations have been contravened; and what action has been taken in each case to stop the pollution. [40378]
§ Mr. ClappisonThis information is not held centrally. Data on discharge consents, including information on sampling and any enforcement action is available from the pollution control register held at the regional offices of the Environment Agency. The National Rivers Authority, and now the Environment Agency, also publish summary monitoring and compliance reports, the latest being for 1994. In that year, 69 per cent. of trade effluent discharges as defined in the report, were compliant with the terms of their consents. The report for 1995 is in preparation.