Great Big Green Week got off to a melodious start on Sunday 9th June with the Sheffield Rivers Ramble and Singing Rally. Organised jointly by the South Yorkshire Climate Alliance and the Sheffield Climate Singers, the event was a celebration of Sheffeld’s Rivers. Three guided walks along the Upper Don, the Five Weirs Walk on the Lower Don and the Sheffield and Tinsley Canal converged at the beautiful plantings of the Castlegate Grey To Green pocket park, which marks the confluence of Sheffeld’s rivers, the Sheaf and the Don. The guides from the Blue Loop Troop and the Sheaf and Porter Rivers Trust gave a fascinating and knowledgeable account of the history of Sheffeld’s rivers and canal and aspirations for their future enhancement. At Castlegate, looking out over the river, members of the Sheffield Climate Choir were joined by singers from across the country who had been raising their voices as part of the National Street Choirs Festival which filled the streets of Sheffield with music throughout the weekend. The combined climate choir of over 34 enthusiastic singers was led by talented choir leader Ryan O’Riordan, who had written an original song, Dirty Water, for the event, decrying the pollution of our waterways.
Initiator of the event Jenny Carpenter, who litter-picked during the walk, said “The rivers are what makes Sheffield special. It was good to celebrate them in situ and in song!”
Earth’s Child was written by Emily Roblyn. Conducted by Ryan O’Riordan
This Dirty Water was written and conducted by Ryan O’Riordan, sung by Sheffield Climate Singers and friends from the National Street Choir Festival.
So Let us Stand was written by Sheffield’s Kate Thomas. Conducted by Ryan O’Riordan. Sung by Sheffield Climate Singers and friends from the National Street Choirs Festival
Along the walk, we contemplated the importance of our rivers and the threats we pose to them and they pose to us.
After many years of slow improvements to our river quality, we are now going backwards. Friends of the Earth eloquently pointed this out recently by fishing for giant turds in the River Don. FOE want to see a law that would empower communities to hold regulators and public bodies accountable for failing to protect our precious waterways. The latest Environment Agency sewage overflow figures from 2023, show that Yorkshire Water had 77,761 spill events which released sewage for more than half a million hours (516,386). Agriculture also poses massive threats to our rivers with effluent sometimes flowing from industrial-scale animal farms and fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides polluting the water.
In inner city Sheffield, another threat is the dumping of waste from cannabis farms. Our hosts from the Rivers Trust explained they regularly test the water quality and ecological health, calling out polluters and tackling illegal dumping.
This of course is an election issue. I searched the manifestos to see what the parties were saying.
Labour promised to put failing water companies under special measures to clean up our water. They will give regulators new powers to block the payment of bonuses to executives who pollute our waterways and bring criminal charges against persistent law breakers. They will impose automatic and severe fines for wrongdoing and ensure independent monitoring of every outlet.
Conservatives say they will work with the regulator to further hold companies to account, including banning executive bonuses if a company has committed a serious criminal breach.
The Lib Dems have some good ideas with a long list of policies including introducing a Sewage Tax on water company profits, enforcing existing laws to ensure that the storm overflows only function in exceptional circumstances and setting legally binding targets to prevent sewage dumping into bathing waters and highly sensitive nature sites by 2030.
The Green Party have more radical solutions. They want to Introduce a new Rights of Nature Act, giving rights to nature itself. They say they will end the scandal of sewage pouring into our rivers and seas by taking the water companies back into public ownership. They want to extend people’s access to green space and waterways close to where they live with a new English Right to Roam Act.
Reform don’t seem to have a manifesto and don’t seem interested in this issue.
The threat the rivers pose to us is of course flooding. There were many reminders of floods along the route, notably Waterloo Walk, off Rutland Road, which is named after a row of houses that were demolished by the Great Sheffield Flood of 1864 when Dyke Dale dam burst killing 240 people. Much of our walk was underwater during the Sheffield flood of 2007. It was important to note some improvements made since then that lessen the risk of flooding, even though the hotter climate brings more rain and fiercer storms. Nursery Street Pocket Park, alongside the Don, has provided welcome space for the river to expand into in times of extreme rainfall. Soon we will see the great reveal of the River Sheaf as part of the new Sheaf Field Park on the site of Sheffield Castle. There has been a long-running campaign led by the Sheaf and Porters River Trust to ensure this was included in the scheme with the restoration of fish passage.
The wonderful planting in Castlegate and surrounding areas is known as the Grey to Green project. This provides sustainable urban drainage in the city.
The scheme has created new footpaths and cycleways, helping us keep fit, clean our air and become better connected. It is currently being expanded to Fargate.
Grey to Green’s innovative drainage system flows rainwater back to rivers in a way that mimics nature – cleanly, slowly and sustainably. The planting beds capture and hold onto particles from car tyres, road wear and pollutants such as oil and microplastics, preventing them from reaching the watercourses. As a result, 24,000 bathtubs’ worth of water is prevented from entering Sheffield’s sewage treatment works each year.
At the end of the rally, Greg Hewitt from Action on Plastic spoke about the importance of avoiding single-use plastic. He called on the Government to legislate, and election candidates to support, the introduction of mandatory standards for the reuse of packaging. You can write to your candidates here to persuade them to legislate for re-use. Refill Sheffield is promoting places where people can refill their water bottles in the city. With more reuse hopefully less plastic will end up in our rivers.
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