Leisure and tourism spots across Yorkshire are being devastated by 171 years-worth of raw sewage discharge, Labour Party analysis has found.

Analysis of Environment Agency figures obtained under Freedom of Information requests by the party, shows that since 2016, raw sewage has been pumped into Yorkshire’s natural environment for a total of more than 1.5million hours.

Areas impacted include popular tourist and bathing spots such as rivers, lakes, and beaches – spoiling areas of natural beauty and risking public health.

Cumulatively, this equates to a duration of 62,000 days or 171 years of sewage discharge taking place across Yorkshire and polluting its environment, a damning indictment of 12 years of Tory failure to hold water bosses to account.

The data also points to a 132092% increase in the number of monitored discharge hours, between 2016 and 2021. This highlights that the situation is only drastically worsening under the Tories, and a consequence of their two-thirds budgetary cut to the Environment Agency grant, which covers environmental surveillance and enforcement.

The full scale of the pollution is likely to be even greater, given that Event Duration Monitoring does not cover every permitted storm overflow.

Labour Party analysis also shows that between 2016 and 2021 there were 169576 spill events into Yorkshire’s waters. This equates to a shocking average of a sewage spill taking place every 18 minutes over a six-year period.

This comes amid revelations that the zombie Tory government shelved sewage discharge reduction plans at the beginning of August – but has since u-turned due to mounting public pressure.

Louise Haigh, MP for Sheffield Heeley said:

“It’s appalling that Yorkshire water continue to dump sewage onto our beaches and waters destroying the natural environment as well as causing a health hazard to the millions of visitors to these sites each year.

“The country is facing a dirty water emergency and this Tory government has sat back and enabled private water companies to treat our waterways as dumping grounds. Labour will end this disgraceful practice, ensure enforcement of unlimited fines for water companies and toughen up regulations that currently allow the system to be abused.”

Jim McMahon, Labour’s Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, said:

“The Tories continuing to allow sewage dumping onto our beaches and into our waters isn’t just a destruction of our natural environment, it’s also a significant public health hazard.

“Families flock to the Yorkshire’s coast to enjoy the British summer. They shouldn’t have to worry about being able to enjoy its coastal hotspots or whether they are swimming in sewage infested waters.

“The Yorkshire Tory MPs that voted against putting a stop to raw sewage discharge must explain to their constituents why they failed to protect their local beauty spots. Labour will clean up the Tories’ mess by ensuring water bosses are held accountable both legally and financially for their recklessness, through enforcement of unlimited fines, and tougher regulations that prevent them from gaming the system.”