It was a pleasure to welcome the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak to Henley-on-Thames today, together with Lucy Demery, the Conservative Parliamentary Candidate for Wokingham. The PM met women rowers at Leander, the leading international rowing club, to highlight the importance of women's sport and of women's safe spaces. He was announcing the Conservative plan to amend the Equality Act to make clear that the protected characteristic of sex is biological sex, ensuring that organisations cannot be prosecuted for maintaining single-sex spaces for women and girls for our dignity, privacy and safety.
I took the opportunity to talk to the PM about the concern I share with many residents here about pollution of our rivers, particularly after a winter of record rainfall. There is still a lot to do, both to remove pollution from our rivers by improving capacity and technology and to rebuild trust - in the water companies, and the government bodies that regulate and monitor them, particularly Ofwat and the Environment Agency.
But we have taken important action already: it's the Conservative Government that has required 100% of storm outflows to be monitored; has insisted on the river companies investing £56 billion in improving sewage treatment plants up till 2035; announced it will impose uncapped fines on water companies polluting illegally; and ensured dividends and bonuses are strictly tied to improvements in water quality.
