propostion: you cannot trust or rely on privatised utilities:PROVED

peter c, devizes, wessex

martin, go and visit you local sewage works itsvery interesting and very educational- buy some good compost while you are there

peter c, devizes, wessex

We eat food from that ocean. Something must be done about this immediately!

William, Ocean City, Maryland, USA

A lot of good work was done in the 1950's connecting outflows to the rivers to sewage treatment plants.Looks as if it was all for nought,but they cleaned up the Thames.
Back to the 1950's Or is it these Liberal ideas of turning a blind eye to things that really matter these days.

C.Smith, Burlington, Canada

Condoms should be banned.Disposal is a health hazard !

derek bevan , huntingdon , england.

As demonstrated by Thames Water - the trick is, to avoid the expensive job of improving your capacity to match the ever growing number of rate payer, just don't! Let the sewage store up, wait for a bit of rain, shout "overload" and dump the lot into the Thames! Works for them...

Chris Sorensen, stockport,

Nothing new. Storm overflows still discharge after a few drops of rain into Ouse at York. Tourists can be treated to the sight of a mixed bag of sewage items draped along the bushes and banks as they float bye on a pleasure trip. The solution was another course of bricks. Then they built more houses

John Skelton, Banska Bystrica, Slovakia

sewage falls into 2 parts, liquid and solid, the latter can be broken down and turned into the former by the ordibary processes of biology- the rest of the liquid you filter through cliker and expose to sunlight which kills the bacteria thereafter it does not matter

peter c, devizes, wessex

No wonder we have whales and other marine life beaching themselves, or dying off our coasts.

Also to Martin . . . your point is valid, except why do we pay a charge for the treatment of sewage in our water bills, if all that is happening is that it is being pumped out into our seas.

Paul Moxon, Birmingham,

there used to be private sewage outfalls on the river teign in devon, from private houses and possibly a couple of villages,but think these were on the tidal sections below newton abbot.the woolen mills in that town also used to be huge poluters but they are long gone.

john haydon rowe, javea,

The Amount of Money they are "Extracting from the Public" plus their "Bonus's for "Successfully acheiving their charges", they should be "Immediately Stopped"! Furthermore I hope a "Class Action" will follow the "Revelation" for "Poisoning!"

Paul, Newtown, Powys, UK

Whenever I took my friends for a walk along Rhossili Beach, if we managed to walk one way in pristine water, on our way back we waded in the unmentionable substance, toilet paper and sanitary napkins from the huge caravan park beyond the dunes. Photographic evidence available at request.

Mariusz Kuklinski, London,

If you want a sewerage system to contain all of the storm flows within it then I hope you have a lot of money to waste. No one will be able to pay the extortionate cost of this. There are in fact some rivers polluted by acid mine waste that would benefit from some organic loading.

Andy, Cornwall,

To be honest, if they dont pump it out of there then where is it supposed to go? Are they meant to make it vanish magically? Or is it meant to all store up in the drain systems so as we get sh...errr sorry i mean sewege blasting out of drains all over the place?

Martin, UK,