Tim Loughton MP is backing the Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) ‘Protect Our Waves’ petition, which has 50,000 signatures, and was delivered to Number 10 today. The petition intends to challenge the rising threats to surfing in the UK.
As MP for East Worthing and Shoreham, Mr Loughton has joined the kite surfing community in lobbying the Government to protect the UK’s best kitesurfing beaches.
The Protect Our Waves Petition hopes to encourage MPs to debate legislation in order to recognise the importance of waves as a cultural, social, economic and environmental asset. It will be delivered to the Prime Minister by Kelly Slater, 11 times surfing World Champion and business leaders from the UK surfing industry.
The petition describes the challenges which the surfing community in the UK faces; Solid structure and damaging new developments, non-polluting contamination (litter), restricted access and sewage. The petition calls upon the Government to tackle these threats to surfing by amending current legislation and potentially passing new legislations to ensure that the following occurs;
- The recognition and protection of the dynamics needed to produce surfing waves
- The strengthening and enforcement of Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs) discharge consents to ensure that there are no more than 3 significant raw sewage discharges during the bathing season
- Delivery of regulation to ensure surfers and recreational water users receive real time warning about significant CSO discharges at affected locations.
- Beach managers should have to carry out at least one beach clean every three months to prevent the dangerous and unsightly accumulations of marine litter.
The major threat facing surfing today is the Combined Sewer Overflow and their possible misuse. According to the water industry, the number of CSOs around the UK is around 31,000. Many of these are completely unregulated. The CSO is a kind of emergency outlet for the sewerage system which discharges raw sewage and wastewater into rivers and into the sea when the system is overloaded. In the 2013 bathing season there were 549 raw sewage spills at the 220 beaches included in SAS’s Sewage Alert Service.