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IWA welcomes Government funding deal

He said the IWA is particularly pleased to see that many of the issues it raised and lobbied for through supporters and MPs had been addressed and that the original settlement has been substantially increased from £390 million over ten years to potentially, £800 million over the full 15 years if you add indexation. There is also the full property portfolio of commercial premises and land worth an additional £460million.

Mr Henderson thanked supporters for all of the time and care they took in contacting and briefing their MPs so that they could lobby government during the negotiations.

"I hope that they will join me in supporting the CRT by providing volunteer support and assistance at local and national level. This will be especially important in the critical first three years before much of the additional funding kicks in.

"The next stage for IWA is to identify and help to resolve any issues that go beyond early teething problems and to ensure that these are fed into the Government’s second year review. IWA will also wish to see Defra provide a detailed programme for the transfer of Environment Agency navigations into the CRT as promised in 2015/2016, so that this process is little more than a formality for the CRT trustees."