Danny Dyer has taken his campaign against sewage pollution straight to Downing Street after sailing along the River Thames beside a giant floating poo sculpture and delivering a petition demanding the return of England’s water industry to public ownership.
The actor joined Sittingbourne and Sheppey MP Kevin McKenna on the Thames before heading to No 10 with a petition backed by nearly 350,000 people.
Organised by campaign group SOS Whitstable, it accuses privatised water companies of exploiting an essential natural resource while failing to invest enough in ageing infrastructure.
Dyer has become increasingly involved in the campaign after experiencing pollution problems around the Isle of Sheppey, where he runs a caravan park with his daughter Dani.
Speaking previously about the state of the local coastline, he said:
“Sometimes when you look out to the sea, you can smell the twang in the air.”
The giant brown sculpture travelling beneath Tower Bridge on Wednesday was difficult to miss, which was rather the point.
‘Enough is enough’
The petition calls directly for the government to return the water industry to public ownership.
Its organisers say:
“This crisis has spiralled out of control, causing severe environmental damage, harming tourism and coastal economies and putting public health at risk.
“Enough is enough.”
Nearly 350,000 people have now backed the campaign, well above the 100,000 signatures normally required for a parliamentary petition to be considered for debate.
McKenna praised Dyer for using his profile to keep attention on the issue.
Speaking outside Downing Street, he said:
“The vast majority of the public is really sick of it. They want it ended, I want it ended, and Danny wants it ended.”
He added:
“Danny’s been great. He’s picked this up and run with it.
“There’s a lot of other things he’s been doing on the island and things he could have campaigned on.
“He’s doing it because it matters to him, and so I’m really grateful that actually he’s making such a big noise about this.
“This is a national movement and I’m glad that Danny’s actually keeping it in the spotlight.”
You can sign the petition here.
Dyer has been campaigning on sewage for weeks
Wednesday’s stunt was not Dyer’s first appearance in the campaign.
He joined his daughter Dani, singer Becky Hill and local environmental campaigners at a sewage protest in Leysdown-on-Sea in September, where demonstrators called for the water system to be brought back into public ownership.
The campaign has focused heavily on coastal communities where sewage discharges can damage bathing water, local tourism and businesses dependent on visitors.
Dyer has repeatedly complained about pollution around Sheppey and described the condition of local bathing water as “a disgrace”.
Water pollution has become one of the most politically potent consequences of the crisis facing England’s privatised water companies, with repeated reports of sewage discharges combining with anger over rising bills, executive bonuses, shareholder payments and the industry’s debt.
The Environment Agency has already described ‘systemic failure’
Campaigners demanding more radical action have plenty of official evidence to point towards.
The Environment Agency’s most recent full environmental performance assessment said results across England’s nine major water and sewerage companies were poor, with the sector recording its lowest overall star rating since the assessment system began in 2011.
Serious pollution incidents rose by 60 per cent in 2024, from 47 to 75.
Three companies alone were responsible for 81 per cent of those serious incidents: Thames Water with 33, Southern Water with 15 and Yorkshire Water with 13.
The regulator described the figures as evidence of “systemic water company failure and underperformance”.
Its separate pollution report said the industry had failed to deliver the sustained reduction in incidents regulators had expected and concluded that some companies had shown a “systemic failure” to meet environmental targets.
Thames Water was also among the companies that performed badly on delivery of required environmental improvements, missing planned deadlines for 121 schemes during the period covered by the regulator’s assessment.
Government inspections uncovered thousands of breaches
Enforcement has increased sharply since then.
The Environment Agency completed more than 10,000 inspections of water company assets in the year to March 2026, compared with far lower inspection levels in previous years.
Those checks uncovered more than 3,000 breaches of environmental permit conditions and led to thousands of demands for remedial work, including repairs to sewage treatment plants and upgrades to infrastructure.
The government argues that stronger inspection, enforcement and investment requirements can improve performance without the disruption and cost involved in immediately nationalising every water company.
Campaigners such as Dyer and SOS Whitstable are not convinced.
Their argument is that pollution is a symptom of a more fundamental problem: companies responsible for an essential public service are still expected to generate returns for private investors.
Burnham has already moved towards more public ownership
The political backdrop has changed significantly since Andy Burnham entered Downing Street.
His government announced at the end of September that the forthcoming Water Bill will remove restrictions limiting government ownership of England’s major water companies.
The change would allow the state to buy much larger stakes in companies where ministers believe public intervention is necessary.
Burnham said the government wanted “public interest” placed at the centre of the industry and promised stronger public control alongside cleaner waterways, fairer bills and tougher accountability.
That represents a major shift away from the model created when the water industry in England and Wales was privatised under Margaret Thatcher in 1989.
It still falls short of immediate full nationalisation.
The government has previously argued that taking the entire industry back into public ownership in one move would involve complex legal processes and could divert money and government capacity away from repairing infrastructure and reducing pollution.
Dyer and the campaigners delivering Wednesday’s petition want ministers to go much further.
Public ownership already has substantial support
Another parliamentary petition calling for a binding referendum on bringing the water industry into public ownership attracted more than 210,000 signatures earlier this year and was debated by MPs in September.
That petition argued that private companies had received more than £85 billion in shareholder payments while infrastructure remained in poor condition.
The government responded at the time by rejecting immediate nationalisation, arguing instead for stronger regulation and enforcement.
Since then, Burnham’s move to remove restrictions on government share ownership has opened the door to considerably more direct state involvement than previous governments were prepared to contemplate.
Dyer’s campaign is now attempting to push that opening all the way towards full public ownership.
Water companies defend investment record
The industry says it is investing heavily to tackle sewage pollution and modernise infrastructure.
Water UK said companies were working to end sewage discharges “as fast as we possibly can”.
Southern Water, which operates across much of the south-east including areas close to the communities involved in the campaign, says it is investing £8.9 billion to tackle pollution and improve its network.
The company also says pollution incidents fell by almost a third between 2023 and 2025.
Those commitments have not ended public anger, particularly when sewage spills happen close to beaches and rivers used for swimming, tourism and recreation.
Dyer’s answer on Wednesday was less technical than another regulatory reform or investment programme.
Put a giant poo on a boat, sail it through London and take 350,000 signatures to Downing Street.
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