Human waste spotted in Melton river

Austin Ruddy spotted it while taking a guest on a walk in the hope of showing them the attractive local environment.

He told the Melton Times: “We paused on the iron bridge opposite Melton sewage works, to see the water lillies and hoping to spot some aquatic life .

“Unfortunately we saw the opposite - fist-sized clods of untreated human excrement floating down the river with flies hovering over it.

“The excrement floated off towards the rapids area and piled rocks in the river - where children were sitting and, further downstream, a fisherman and his small family were.

“I know that teenagers paddle and swim in this river but thankfully they were not doing so at the time.”

Severn Trent said officials had been out to that stretch of the river since it was reported but had not found any human waste floating in it.

A spokeswoman said: “After carrying out a full investigation, we didn’t find any issues on our network, and everything was as it should be.

“We’d encourage customers to contact us straight away if they see anything that doesn’t look right and we’ll come back out to do more tests.”

The company said there had been no sewage discharges via the storm routes at the nearby Melton sewage works.

Concerns have been raised over whether the existing plant will be able to cope with the thousands of extra houses due to be built around the town over the next 20 years.

With this in mind, Severn Trent said there would be ‘major investment’ in the works over the next year.