Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the preservation of local rivers as a habitat for a diverse ecology.

In England, River Basin Management Plans provide the framework for protecting and improving the water environment and focus on the period 2016 to 2021. The Plans for England confirm over £3 billion of investment by 2021, leading to improvements in at least 680 water bodies, including an overall target to enhance at least 8000km of waters by 2021 taking account of progress that has been made and the best evidence then on what can be achieved by 2027.

Over the last two decades there have been significant improvements in water quality, and rivers which were biologically dead are now thriving. Independent analysis of Environment Agency data by the University of Cardiff in 2014 demonstrated that organisms dependent on cleaner waters, faster flows and high oxygen concentrations have been progressively recolonizing Britain's urban rivers over a 20 year period. Atlantic salmon, mayflies, and dippers are prime examples.