On Wednesday 24 August, French MEPs from the Renew Europe group - Pierre Karleskind, Nathalie Loiseau and Stéphanie Yon-Courtin - spoke out against large-scale untreated sewage discharges into the Channel and North Sea by the UK.
The three MEPs wrote to Virginijus Sinkevičius, European Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, expressing their concerns about the “negative consequences on the quality of the marine waters we share with this country and, incidentally, on marine biodiversity, but also on the activities of fishermen and shellfish farmers”.
“We ask the Commission to use all political and legal means at its disposal to stop the situation”, the letter reads.
“The violation of the principle of non-regression of environmental protection levels provided for in the trade agreement with the United Kingdom must call for a response from the Commission”, says Nathalie Loiseau.
“The Channel and the North Sea are not a dumping ground”, says Stéphanie Yon-Courtin.
“We cannot accept that the United Kingdom should renege on its environmental commitments made at the time of Brexit and call into question the efforts that have been made by Europeans over the last twenty years”, protests Pierre Karleskind, chairman of the European Parliament’s Committee on Fisheries. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)