{"id":1130005,"date":"2026-08-04T14:45:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T14:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1130005\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T14:45:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T14:45:22","slug":"khan-launches-new-plan-to-reverse-the-decline-in-our-rivers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1130005\/","title":{"rendered":"Khan launches new plan to ‘reverse the decline in our rivers’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The mayor this week launched a his clean water plan which aims to transform London\u2019s \u201cblue spaces\u201d into swimmable areas where wildlife thrives, reports Kumail Jaffer, Local Democracy Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"OutdoorOutdoor swimming at West Reservoir in Hackney (credit GLA)<\/p>\n

Sir Sadiq Khan has blamed \u201cdecades of neglect\u201d from water firms and Londoners for the state of the capital\u2019s waterways.<\/p>\n

London mayor named Thames Water as one of the key culprits for dumping sewage into the city\u2019s rivers but said they had recognised the consequences and have subsequently agreed to commit \u00a31.7billion over the next five years to depolluting the water.<\/p>\n

Khan was speaking as he launched his ten-year Clean Rivers and Waterways Plan, aimed at transforming London\u2019s \u201cblue spaces\u201d into swimmable areas where wildlife thrives.<\/p>\n

The strategy will start by focusing on ten locations across different parts of the city, including the Lea Valley in north-east London and the Pymmes and Salmon brooks in Enfield.<\/p>\n

City Hall pledged another \u00a32.7million to the plan this week, on top of \u00a313.5m already promised, while various partners, including Thames Water, will fund the project to the tune of \u00a31.8bn.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis the most ambitious plan to clean up rivers and waterways across the globe,\u201d Khan told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) at the launch of the plan at the West Reservoir in Hackney, which was awarded \u00a3700,000 in 2022 for various upgrades and now offers open water swimming, sailing and kayaking.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe as a city have 600 kilometres of rivers and waterways. But there\u2019s been decades of neglect and pollution which has led to local communities not having access to blue spaces, and it\u2019s also led to the habitats being damaged so there\u2019s less wildlife.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I first ran to be mayor in 2016, I was told it would take almost 200 years to clean up the air in London. We did it in nine.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we\u2019ve set out to do with this plan is to reverse the decline in our rivers, but also work with other partners to reduce pollution, revive nature, and to revitalise and restore access for local communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of water [companies] who are responsible to a large extent for sewage discharge, misconnections in pipes and homes and so forth \u2013 they are going to be partners in this endeavour.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is water firms recognising the consequences of their inaction and their neglect. In 2023 we had five times as much sewage discharge than in 2022 \u2013 that\u2019s unacceptable.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got these misconnections in people\u2019s pipes which means sewage is going into rivers. That can\u2019t be right.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so Thames Water have done a couple of things which I support. One is investing in cleaning up our rivers and waterways but also the Thames Tideway Tunnel is a remarkable feat of engineering. They will take away around 95% of the storm overflow that goes into our sewers which is really important and hopefully that will lead to less sewage discharge.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut they have got to recognise one of the reasons we\u2019re having to clean up our river and revive nature is because of their actions over the previous decades.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pleased that they\u2019ve been around the table working really collegiately with us over the last year to come up with this Clean Rivers and Waterways plan.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mayor also pledged to work with local authorities and community groups to ensure waterways stay clean after being depolluted \u2013 though he warned that some Londoners need to change their attitude towards blue spaces.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cOne of the reasons why we\u2019ve had the neglect and pollution is our behaviour as human beings.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve dewilded our city, we\u2019ve not behaved as good custodians of these rivers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got to rewire our own brains in terms of thinking about these blue spaces like we did about green spaces as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really proud that London was the first global city to be a national park city that brought with the responsibilities. We\u2019ve invested a huge sum of money in improving what\u2019s called green infrastructure. We need to do the same with blue infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe beauty of our plan today is that by allowing and encouraging and making it easy for local residents to access this blue space, they have ownership. It\u2019s their blue space, which means they\u2019ll look after it more.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got to think about good design, making sure there are bins available, making sure there are benches available, making sure there is signage available.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a win-win because it means that Londoners get to enjoy these great assets, but they also take responsibility for these assets as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said councils like Hackney \u201chave been great working with us\u201d adding that they \u201cdeserve credit\u201d.<\/p>\n

Khan said: \u201cDifferent councils, different community organisations are involved, and the lead partner in charge of each action is different. It\u2019s not all City Hall or all councils. That will mean that each of us can hold each other to account. Those checks and balances are really important.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mayor was joined on the visit by deputy mayor for environment Mete Coban and former deputy prime minister David Lammy, whose constituency the launch was held in.<\/p>\n

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More Information about donations<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The mayor this week launched a his clean water plan which aims to transform London\u2019s \u201cblue spaces\u201d into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1130006,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7757],"tags":[748,26387,393,728,4884,7669,257,213000,307510,37096,14252,213001,28889,16,15],"class_list":["post-1130005","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-london","tag-britain","tag-city-hall","tag-england","tag-environment","tag-great-britain","tag-lea-valley","tag-london","tag-pymmes-brook","tag-river-lea","tag-rivers","tag-sadiq-khan","tag-salmons-brook","tag-thames-water","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117037783465111730","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1130005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1130005"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1130005\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1130006"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1130005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1130005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1130005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}