Labour vows to take on vested interests to protect environment

Labour will take on vested interests from water companies to housebuilders and farmers in an effort to restore Britain's degraded natural environment, the party's environment chief has said.

- Fiona Harvey, Helena Horton

Steve Reed, the shadow environment secretary, said: "If the Tories want to have an election fight over that, bring it on, because the British people care about the countryside, they care about nature. They care about living in a beautiful country.

They value their access to the countryside. The Conservatives are on the wrong side of all that, and to many, many voters that will tip their votes." Vested interests had provoked a sewage crisis in British waterways, he said. "The government has formed a coalition between the Conservative party and rogue water bosses.

"They are allowing these companies to illegally exploit our waterways by filling them up with record levels of sewage to boost their profits.