‘Like fly-tipping’: ministers ignoring pleas to cut sludge fertiliser use

Exclusive: Defra warned three years ago of farmland contamination by water firms’ sewage-derived productGovernment ministers have ignored Environment Agency pleas to tighten rules on the use of sludge fertiliser for three years, despite the regulator having said that water company attitudes towards the substance are “akin to fly-tipping on to agricultural land”, it can be revealed.Sludge, sometimes referred to as biosolids, is a byproduct of the sewage treatment process that is