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MPs have called for a worldwide ban on plastic microbeads in cosmetic products following a report by the Environmental Audit Committee highlighting the damaging impact they can have on the marine environment.

The UK bathing season starts this month and runs until the end of September. For 2014, monitoring data will be assessed using the standards set in the current bathing water directive. This is the last season these standards will be used. From 2015, bathing water quality will be assessed using new, stricter standards.

The Government’s consultation on abstraction licence reform was a useful first step but more work is needed with Defra officials and other key stakeholders to fully understand the impacts of the proposals.

Water re-use systems can use rainwater, or treated water from washing, reducing per capita consumption by up to half. However, even developers of environmentally friendly housing schemes say few homebuyers want to install water re-use systems.

The water industry has begun to think about what it would like to see from a revision of the Water Framework Directive.

It might seem difficult to believe, as the weather forecasts warn of yet more rain, but it was only two years ago that parts of Britain were starting to recover from two years of extremely low rainfall. Dry, cold, wet, hot – the meteorological rollercoaster ride of the past three or four years has been exceptional.