Published25 minutes ago
Campaigners are taking the government to court accusing it of failing to stop chicken manure polluting the River Wye.
The case has been brought by the charity River Action which says laws designed to keep waterways healthy have not been enforced.
The Wye last year had its status downgraded to “unfavourable” with some blaming the rapid expansion of chicken farming in the catchment area.
The Environment Agency said anyone breaking the law could be prosecuted.
The Wye flows along the English-Welsh border and is home to otters, kingfishers and the endangered Atlantic Salmon.
“We believe that the government and the Environment Agency, have acted unlawfully by deliberately not enforcing the critical regulation that, had it been in force, would have prevented the contamination of the Wye Catchment area,” Charles Watson, the chair of River Action, told the BBC.
At the heart of the judicial review, which is being heard in Cardiff, are regulations known as the Farming Rules for Water.
Introduced in 2018 they state that farmers must make sure that fertiliser does not get into watercourses and that they should not put more on fields than is needed.
River Action say the Environment Agency deliberately ignored the rules under pressure from farmers, allowing them to apply excessive amounts of manure to fields, creating nutrient rich run-off that found its way into the River Wye and its tributaries.
The Environment Agency (EA) said it does
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