Image source, BBC News Image caption, Protestor exterior court as the case kicks off on River Wye contamination By Jonah Fisher environment reporter and Nicola Goodwin, BBC Midlands Investigations Team Campaigners are taking the Environment Agency to court, implicating it of not stopping chicken manure contaminating the River Wye. The charity River Action, who brought the case, states laws to keep waterways healthy have not been imposed. The Wye last year had its status devalued to “unfavourable”, and the quick growth of chicken farming in the catchment location was partially blamed. The Environment Agency stated anybody breaking the law might be prosecuted. The Wye streams along the English-Welsh border and is home to otters, kingfishers and the threatened Atlantic salmon. “We think that the federalgovernment and the Environment Agency have acted unlawfully by intentionally not implementing the vital policy that, had it been in force, would have avoided the contamination of the Wye catchment location,” Charles Watson, the chairman of River Action, informed the BBC. A handful of protestors, consistingof water advocate and artist Feargal Sharkey, were outside court on Wednesday as the case started. At the heart of the judicial evaluation, which is being heard in Cardiff, are guidelines understood as the farming guidelines for water. Introduced in 2018, they state that farmers needto make sure that fertiliser does not get into watercourses and that they must not put more on fields than is required. River Action state the Environment Agency, which has duty for England, intentionally overlooked the guidelines under pressure from farmers. River Action states this enabled the farmers to use extreme quantities of manure to fields, producing nutrient abundant run-off that discovered its method into the River Wye and its tributaries. The Environment Agency stated it does not remark on continuous legal procedures however that “anyone captured breaching ecological laws dealswith enforcement action, up to and consistingof prosecution”.
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