If you happened to be walking across Westminster Bridge earlier this week and encountered the odd sight of some people in waders haranguing a wind swept government minister then let me just explain.
The people inside the waders were members of some of the UK’s many river action groups – the people who campaign on issues like pollution in your local river. They were joined by anglers and conservationists to take environment minister Huw Irranca-Davies to task over the government’s plans for rivers.
These plans will be published next month and set out how rivers in England and Wales will be cared for until 2015. You may recall stories in media from earlier this year when it was revealed that three quarters of rivers are failing European quality targets.
The RSPB is part of the Our Rivers campaign alongside the WWF, the Angling Trust and the Association of Rivers Trusts. With such a strong coalition of campaigning organisations all focussed on one issue Mr Irranca-Davies was only too happy to meet us and hear our concerns – despite the inclement weather.
We put our concerns to him on pollution, over abstraction and other issues which are putting our river wildlife under threat and he told us the government would take these issues on board. Whether robust and ambitious plans to bring our waterways up to scratch will become a reality remains to be seen, but we will continue to knock on the government’s door until we get the best deal for our beleaguered native fish, riverbank mammals, birds and invertebrates.