Sewage was discharged into North East rivers 29,697 times in 2022, new figures have shown. 

Northumbria Water, which discharged sewage into rivers for a total of 107,536 hours last year, has said that they saw a reduction in spills and duration of discharges, but that "there is still more to do". 

This data comes as ministers plan to unveil unlimited fines for water companies that pollute waterways. 

Currently, companies are allowed to discharge untreated sewage into rivers in exceptional circumstances (e.g., during storms).

Read more: Redcar and Saltburn beaches under sewage pollution warnings

But water companies may be acting illegally if they discharge sewage when the conditions are dry, or if they are not treating enough of the waste before releasing it.

Activist group Surfers Against Sewage campaigns for an end to sewage discharge into UK bathing waters as it "makes us sick, spoils our favourite swim spots, destroys delicate ecosystems, kills our wildlife, and threats ocean recovery."

But Water UK, which represents the water industry, insisted there were "very high levels of compliance" with the law, and said that while "enforcement is vital if rules are broken, it will only ever be a tiny part of the effort to restore rivers to where they need to be."

Easington MP Grahame Morris has criticised the Government for treating the country "like an open sewer".

Read more: Teesside and County Durham beaches had sewage dumped into them

In his constituency, there were 724 sewage spill incidents in 2022, dumping sewage into local waterways for 2424 hours. This equates to a continuous flow of sewage for over three months of the year.

Grahame Morris said: "Our coastline communities and businesses should not have to worry about Tory-sanctioned sewage dumping impacting employment, trade, and opportunity. We must end the Tory sewage scandal and assign to history the disgraceful images of sewage pipes pumping raw human waste into our rivers and coastlines.

"If you love our country, and all its wonderful natural beauty and ecology, the Government would not allow water companies to treat our environment and communities as an open sewer.”

Labour Party analysis found that a new sewage dumping event takes place every two-and-a-half minutes - but Tory MP Richard Holden said that he is "delighted that over the last 20 years, pollutant loads in rivers from water industry discharges have declined by 70 per cent.

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He added: "In the last decade we've taken the next step with greater monitoring and have not done from just six per cent of rivers monitored to almost 90 per cent, and will hit 100 per cent by the end of the year. 

"It is only by monitoring that we know the scale of the future challenge. 

"This is part of our game-changing programme to clean up our rivers. For the first time, water companies must now monitor the impact of their assets that discharge sewage with strong penalties in place, on top of criminal and civil investigation breaches. 

"I am proud of our record but I still want to see this go much further still."

On last year's record of sewage spills, a spokesperson for Northumbria Water said: “While the 2022 results show notable improvements with reductions in spills and the duration of those discharges, we know there is still more to do and are working hard to continue to improve.  

“In 2022 we saw reductions of around 20% in spills per overflow and 40% in the average duration of spills. The results also show an increase in the number of overflows that didn’t spill or spilled fewer than 20 times.  While this is, in part, the result of the weather and a year with fewer intense storms, it also reflects our investment and focus in this area.

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“We understand and share customers’ passion for things to improve further. We are investing more than £80 million towards reducing our reliance on and use of storm overflows between 2020 and 2025.

“We are working with our local communities, and with the rest of the industry and Government, and were involved as part of the Storm Overflow Task Force, to look at how the UK wastewater and drainage infrastructure is designed and the investment needed to work effectively now and in the future.

“In its latest assessment, the Environment Agency awarded our environmental performance Four Stars, the highest rating possible, and we are proud of this and recent industry-leading performance on pollution.”