Meeting today to address Whitehaven Harbour water colour issue
Josh MacAlister believes faster progress is needed to tackle the issue.
A meeting between organisations keen on resolving the Whitehaven Harbour water colour issue is taking place today, led by MP Josh MacAlister.
The orange water was first noticed in Whitehaven in November 2022, and since then questions have been raised over the cause of water discolouration and any possible solutions.
According to the Whitehaven Harbour Commissioners website: "The contaminated water is getting into Queens Dock through something called a culvert.
"A culvert is a tunnel or pipe that allows water to flow under things like roads and railways. In Queens Dock, the culvert is releasing water from Bransty Beck and a drainage system in Bransty railway tunnel.
"Bransty railway tunnel takes trains underground between Corkickle and Whitehaven. In recent years, this tunnel has started to flood. Tests have shown that the floodwater has iron ochre in it, which makes sense because the tunnel runs through areas where coal is found.
"As soon as the contaminated water began to arrive in the harbour, we started working with Whitehaven Marina Ltd, the Environment Agency, Network Rail, the Coal Authority, Cumberland Council and our local MP to test the water, find the source and look for a way to stop it."
However progress on a solution to the issue has been slow, resulting in a parliamentary group being set up to address the problem, with the current work group that includes the likes of the harbour commissioners and Network Rail meeting today.
MP Josh MacAlister believes progress so far, over the two years, has been too slow and now that he is the elected representative for the area, he wants to speed up the work.
He said: "People aren't clear who is responsible for this. Surveys are commissioned to try and find out what the situation is, they come back, then someone says we need a further survey.
"It's infuriating, but the fact it's a complex problem does not mean local representatives like myself should just throw our hands up in the air and give up.
"It's too soon to know where the liability for funding any fix will lie, but I imagine what will happen is once we're clear on a solution and it's cost, we can work on creative ways on getting multiple agencies to contribute to solving it.
"I honestly can't tell people when it'll be fixed or when the solution will be. It'll be entirely guess work for me to do so, and I don't think that would be right."