President’s bulletin: history shows that health improves when we do not stand back

We don’t always have to wait for new laws to make meaningful progress in environmental and public health. In this bulletin, CIEH President Mark Elliott, invites environmental health professionals to consider the legislative tools already at our disposal.

As a newly qualified Environmental Health Officer, my courtroom baptism came swiftly: an appearance every two weeks before the Stipendiary Magistrate in Cardiff, dealing with Abatement Notices for housing defects. At my first witness appearance, my knees were knocking. By the time I left to continue my career in west Wales, I was a confident court witness, with a successful record in both housing and contested food hygiene cases. Courtroom confidence was not innate; it was learned. And it mattered.

Recent public debate sometimes suggests that progress in environmental health must await the next Bill, the next White Paper, the next reforming Act of Parliament. In housing, much attention is now placed on the forthcoming Renters’ Rights Act. It represents an important step forward. Yet, as CIEH Vice and Past President Dr Stephen Battersby reminded readers in The Guardian (3 February 2026), we already possess formidable tools.

Since 2020, every tenancy in England has carried an implied covenant under Section 9A of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 (as amended) requiring a home is free from any HHSRS hazards that would make the dwelling unfit for human habitation. This would be the basis of an action by the tenant and is not enforced by the local authority, however EHPs can advise and help. Alongside this are the enforcement provisions of the Housing Act 2004, statutory nuisance powers, and a wide architecture of public health protections. These are not aspirations for 2035. They are already duties.

Public confidence in water quality has also been shaken by the well-documented discharge of untreated sewage into rivers, streams and the sea. Channel 4’s Dirty Business has exposed what many communities have known for years. In 1858 the stench from the Thames drove Parliament from complacency into action. History can teach us something, as patterns are repeated, no matter the ever-changing world around us. If 2026 becomes our modern great stink equivalent, it will be because public patience has finally run out and Government can no longer defer confronting the systemic failures of water privatisation.

While a new vision for water is planned, CIEH Past President Dr Tim Everett has reminded us that Section 259(1)(a) of the Public Health Act 1936 remains in force as a category of statutory nuisance. Section 259(1)(a) was expressly designed to address the pollution of watercourses. One of the specific binding parts of the Court of Appeal decision of Falmouth and Truro Port Health Authority v South West Water was to exclude estuary waters and therefore also the open sea from the definition of "watercourse" in Section 259.

However, contamination of inland waters remains within scope and Regina v Carrick District Council ex parte Shelley has relevance on statutory nuisance procedure. The Supreme Court decision in the Manchester Ship Canal case 2024 is that the Water Industry Act does not give sewerage undertakers immunity from nuisance actions. It is clear from all case law that local authorities do have the authority (and arguably a duty) to deal with inland watercourses, including where they are "so foul or in such a state as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance” or “accumulations or deposits” as the result of discharges by water and sewerage companies. Where evidence supports intervention, Environmental Health Practitioners have powers that can be explored lawfully, proportionately and with a statutory duty to do so.

This is not a call for heavy-handedness. The legislative tools are already at our disposal. Advice, engagement and partnership can sometimes achieve as much as legal action. However, If there is a duty to serve a formal notice, it should be served. Enforcement is, at times, a necessary and legitimate expression of our professional commitment to improving and protecting health, and preventing avoidable harm and illness.

Our predecessors 150 years ago did not wait for perfect statutes. They worked with what they had, often imperfect legislation and limited resources, but with clarity of purpose. They understood that environmental and public health advances not only through drafting new laws, but through the confident and proportionate use of existing ones.

Robert Angus Smith (1817-1884), one of the first inspectors under the Rivers Pollution Act 1876, faced pressure to temper enforcement. When asked how many prosecutions he had taken, the answer – four – startled his superiors. Even then, the tension between regulation and industry was evident. Still reluctant, he ensured that every final prosecution decision was made in consultation with the Local Government Board, being careful not to strain his relationship with manufacturers. Whether we would now describe this as a form of regulatory capture is open to debate. What is not open to debate is the enduring importance of professional independence.

In his research thesis, Dr Tim Everett, researcher in Environmental Health law, found that many colleagues have not taken formal enforcement action for two years or more. He is concerned that colleagues have fewer opportunities to be involved with the courts etc. these days and may therefore feel less confident about taking such action. They also appear to have had less practice drafting notices during their training.

Lengthy delays in the court system can occur in dealing with appeals and prosecutions which do not support taking effective legal action. There can be variability in the experience and approach of District and Tribunal Judges.

Any obstacle, financial, organisational or cultural, that blunts the proper exercise of our statutory powers must be identified and addressed. The “Prosecutions – interesting cases and lessons learnt” pages in EHN and media reporting on legal cases demonstrate that environmental health stands ready to act, guided by evidence and without fear or favour.

Professional confidence is not aggression. It is competence combined with judgement. It means knowing when advice will suffice and when public safety demands legal intervention as a duty or not.

Environmental and public health progress does not always require new laws. Often, it requires renewed confidence in the law we already have.

The statute book is not silent. Nor should we be.

I welcome correspondence from members – [email protected]