Perth and Kinross councillor raises loch sewage spill concerns with Scottish minister

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A councillor has written to Scotland’s environment minister to draw her attention to a recent discharge of sewage into Loch Leven and ask if anything can be done to stop further pollution incidents in future.Kinross-shire councillor Willie Robertson decided to write to the minister to highlight the incident after receiving a response from SEPA he felt was dismissive of his concerns for the quality of water in the loch.Councillor Robertson contacted the agency saying large quantities of untreated sewage leaked from a local waste water treatment plant over the heritage trail and into the loch on September 8.The body suggested a reason sewage could have been discharged to the loch was sewers in the area accept both surface water and foul water and heavy showers had filled the sewers to the point if the water was not drained somewhere it would back up into people’s properties.“Obviously your constituents would not appreciate their homes being flooded with sewage,” SEPA told councillor Robertson in their reply.“Therefore, until the entire historic sewer network is replaced, separating out the foul water from the surface water, the only other alternative is discharge to the environment during periods of heavy rainfall.“This is not a system unique to the Loch Leven Catchment and is a historic standard sewer design across Scotland.”Councillor Robertson has said he considers that response to be inadequate, however, and has now written to Mairi McAllan MSP asking if she can intervene to make the protection of the loch more of a priority.“I am contacting you with regard to a serious pollution incident which occurred at Loch Leven [last] month,” councillor Robertson wrote.“As you may well know Loch Leven is a SSSI and RAMSAR site so