Election in Scotland 2026: What Are Parties Promising on Sewage and Plastic Pollution?

As the 2026 Scottish Parliament Election draws closer, political parties are setting out their visions for the country — including commitments about what they are going to tackle the plastic and sewage pollution of our rivers, coastlines and communities.

Recent progress shows that public pressure from communities, campaigners and water users is starting to make a difference. Earlier this year, the Scottish Government’s draft Circular Economy Strategy was widely criticised for being weak – notably, it did not even mention the word “plastic”, despite the scale of the pollution crisis. Campaigners, eNGOs and communities across the UK and Scotland (including SAS), called this out and pushed for a far stronger approach, embedding clear asks for plastics reduction and circular systems in our Scottish Election Manifesto. Just weeks ago, a revised strategy was published, which is significantly stronger and more ambitious, with a clearer focus on reducing waste, even mentioning the upcoming plastics treaty. It’s a powerful example of how public pressure can shift policy in real time.  

But while this progress deserves recognition, the road ahead remains long. Many of our core asks – from binding sewage-reduction targets and a world-leading water testing regime to full monitoring of overflows and meaningful action to cut plastic pollution – are still missing or underpowered in party commitments to date. 

One thing is clear: we still need bold, urgent, transparent, well‑funded action to end sewage and plastic pollution. With the help of our communities, we’ve already published exactly what the next Scottish Government must deliver…   

Read our Scottish manifesto

This includes calls to:  

1. Protect public health
2. Reveal the truth through 100%sewage discharge monitoring
3. Enforce the law throughtough independentregulators  
4. Cut plastic production and create a circular economy. 

So, as parties begin publishing and refining their manifestoes, we’re assessing what they currently promise and how this compares to the action Scotland’s water users and environments, desperately need.      

The Reality

Sewage Crisis: Scottish Water recorded 23,000 sewage discharges in 2024 – but that’s from only a fraction of the system that is monitored, and the real number could be as high as 360,000 discharges. Without full monitoring, enforcement, and investment, Scotland cannot hope to protect public health or the environment. 

Plastic Crisis: While Scotland has taken leaps ahead of the rest of the UK on several plastic bans, the 2025 SAS Brand Audit data revealed that Scotland is experiencing persistent, high levels of plastic pollution, highlighting the urgent need for upstream solutions such as reducing production, extending producer responsibility, and expanding reuse systems. 

What is a Manifesto and why are they important?

A manifesto is a public declaration of a political party or candidates aims or policies. In other words, it’s a list of all the things a party or candidates will do if they are elected. Manifestos allow politicians to let voters know what they will do if they are elected. So, they are really important way of helping people choose who to vote for. They are also great way we can hold politicians to account once they are elected. If they promise to do something in their manifesto, there is a strong expectation that they will deliver it when they are in government. If they don’t, we can hold them to account. 

Scottish Conservatives

The Scottish Conservatives 2026 manifesto does not include any specific commitments on sewage reduction, water quality monitoring, or tackling plastic pollution. While the manifesto references broader environmental priorities, such as supporting biodiversity and protecting the countryside from industrialisation , there is no mention of binding targets to reduce sewage discharges, nor any plans to expand monitoring of overflows or enforce stricter regulation of water companies. Similarly, the party does not propose measures to cut single-use plastics, advance circular economy practices, or introduce upstream solutions to prevent pollution. 

Read Scottish Conservatives’ Manifesto  

Reform UK Scotland

Reform UK Scotland’s manifesto 2026 does not include any specific commitments on sewage reduction, water quality monitoring, or tackling plastic pollution. The manifesto does include a commitment to ‘protect rural Scotland’ and ‘Support outdoor recreation’ however this is in reference to creating accessible paths, with no mention of protecting the health of water users. Reform UK’s manifesto also includes a commitment to scrap all net zero targets. 

Read Reform UK Scotland’s Manifesto  

Scottish Greens

Sewage 

• Increase the fines that can be brought against individuals and companies who damage the environment, with imprisonment for those responsible for the worst offences, as part of wider measures included in a Corporate Accountability and Ecocide Bill. 

• Increase funding for Scotland’s public environment agencies so that they can undertake their full range of duties, from enforcing penalties on polluters to monitoring the condition of nature reserves and protected features and species. 

• Introduce a Clean Water Bill that will ensure all of Scotland’s rivers and lochs are clean and safe for nature, swimming and recreation. We will require 100% monitoring of sewage overflows, accompanied by statutory action requirements, and tighter controls on use of chemicals in and around our waterways. 
• Provide funding and support for the restoration of river catchments at a regional scale working collaboratively with land managers and other stakeholders, taking forward actions to restore nature to reduce flood and drought risks, tackle pollution from  agricultural run-offs and other contaminants that threaten the health of our rivers. 

Plastic 

• Scale up reuse, repair and remanufacturing through national reuse targets, repairvouchersand dedicated funding for community repair hubs, and provide transition funding to enable successful reuse organisations to scale without being crowded out by the private sector.  
• Require some product manufacturers to take back used products, such as mattresses and textiles, at the end of their life, and extend the scope of Extended Producer Responsibility Schemes so that items can be repurposed or fully recycled.  
• Pilot a Scot Repair Voucher scheme which would allow a discount on repair of household goods by participating manufacturers and retailers.
• Implement regulations to ban the destruction of unsold consumer goods inScotland.  

The Greens’ manifesto includes welcome approaches to sewage and water pollution – framed around clear legal standards, stronger enforcement and full transparency. Theproposed Clean Water Bill focussed on ensuring safe and clean waters for recreation is a welcome sign of intent. We want that bill to end sewage pollution into the places we swim play and surf by 2030.  The commitment to require 100% monitoring of sewage overflows is a crucial step to ending pollution which is very welcome. This is reinforced by plans to significantly increase fines for environmental damage, introduce criminal liability – including imprisonment for the most serious cases – through a Corporate Accountability and Ecocide Bill. It also a positive step to see a commitment to increase funding for environmental agencies so they can properly enforce the rules and monitor water quality.To go further we would like to see a commitment to develop a world leading testing regime that protects water users whenever, wherever and however they use the water. 

On plastics the Greens manifesto focuses on creating a circular economy aimed at keeping products in use longer. . The green’s aim to achieve this transition through national reuse targets, repair vouchers, community repair hubs, bans on destroying unsold consumer goods and expanded producer responsibility schemes, including mandatory take‑back of certain products. This approach signals a welcome shift of responsibility upstream to manufacturers and will help reduce the production of materials. The Manifesto however falls short of setting explicit targets to cut the production. We would like to see all parties go further and make clear the only way to end plastic pollution is by reducing production in the first instance.  

Read Scottish Greens Manifesto 

Scottish National Party (SNP)

Sewage 

• The experience of privatised water services in England demonstrates the value of Scotland’s vital water resources being in public hands. That’s why we are committed to Scottish Water remaining in public hands and will resist any attempts to privatise it. 

• Urban waterways are used across Europe for recreation. We will seek to learn from the examples of projects like the Copenhagen Harbour Baths and river pools to bring our urban waterways into better use. We will commission feasibility studies on the viability and cost of bringing urban waterways like the Govan Graving Docks in Glasgow, and Wardie Bay and sections of the Water of Leith in Edinburgh into safe usage. 

Plastic 

• There are no direct plastic reduction or circular economy commitments, however there are commitments to deliver a just transition from oil and gas, which would directly impact the production of plastic in Scotland.  

The SNP manifesto sets out that the SNP will largely maintain the status by resisting any attempts to privatise Scottish Water, citing the known poor performance of privatised English companies.  The manifesto commits to looking into whether urban water ways can be brought into safe water usage learning from other cities in Europe, this is however a vague commitment to a feasibility study not action. Apart from this the manifesto contains very little new detailed policy offers on tackling sewage pollution, protecting public health. We need to see far more ambitious polices from the SNP starting with a commitment to monitor 100% of sewage overflows to reveal the true extent of the Scottish sewage scandal and clear legally binding targets to end sewage pollution and protect water users health. We also need to see far greater funding for regulators so that they can enforce the current law.   

The SNP’s Scottish Parliament manifesto makes no commitment to cut plastic production at source or to move towards a more circular economy. However, there is a welcome commitment to a ‘just transition’ away from a fossil fuel to a renewable economy. Production of plastics pellets take place in the Grangemouth industrial cluster and we would want to see the promised creation of additional jobs must be the creation of circular jobs rather than further investment in plastic production. 

We want to see the SNP and all parties set out explicit targets to cut plastic production. 

Read SNP’s Manifesto

Scottish Labour

Sewage 

Scotland is a water rich country, but we need to make sure supplies remain resilient into the future. Although Scottish Water is a publicly owned company, it isn’t delivering for Scots as it should. Scottish Labour will end the creeping privatisation, and protect the availability and quality of Scotland’s water by: 

• Returning Scottish Water to public service values, restricting executive bonuses, prioritising in-house delivery, improving accountability to Parliament and taking a more constructive approach to industrial relations.
  Preventing above-inflation hikes to household water bills, while Scottish Water generates multi-million surpluses. 

• Increasing monitoring of sewage overflows as a priority, boosting coverage to match levels elsewhere in the UK and improving transparency by making real-time data available to the public. 

• Protecting water sports participants, expanding testing at water sports sites, reviewing the pollutants monitored and ensuring regulators hold polluters to account. 

• Commissioning a water scarcity plan, ensuring Scotland’s water needs and use are managed strategically and future proofed. 

• Promoting nature-based mitigations which restore freshwater habitats and reduce the impact of flooding. 

Plastic 

Scottish Labour will build a more circular economy and help everyone to play their part in making Scotland a greener and healthier place to live by: 

• Working with local authorities to improve recycling rates and reuse facilities, learning from the best practice and ensuring more recycling is processed in Scotland, not shipped elsewhere. 

• Tackling littering and waste from drinks’ containers, rolling out the deposit return scheme and introducing a small charge for single-use takeaway cups. 

• Reducing the destruction of unsold goods, helping businesses to partner with local charities and distribution services like Multibank so goods help those in need. 

Labour’s sewage commitments signal a welcome shift towards stronger public accountability for Scottish Water, particularly through pledges to restore public service values, restrict executive bonuses, improve parliamentary oversight and prioritise in‑house delivery. However, this must also be matched by a clear requirement that Scottish Water abides by the law to treat sewage effectively, alongside a commitment to properly resource SEPA so they can do their job and hold the utility to account. Labour’s prioritisation of increased sewage‑overflow monitoring is an absolute must — we cannot fix the problem until we know where it is — but the party must be unequivocal that this means 100% monitoring, not partial coverage benchmarked to current UK norms. Commitments to protect water sports participants by expanding testing, reviewing monitored pollutants and improving transparency are very welcome, but need to guarantee year‑round testing and coverage for all water users, . Measures to prevent above‑inflation water bill rises, promote nature‑based flood mitigation, and commission a strategic water‑scarcity plan strengthen the package, but without firmer enforcement, universal monitoring and empowered regulators, there remains a risk that improved governance does not yet translate into consistently cleaner rivers, lochs and coastal waters. 

Labour’s circular‑economy proposals set out a broadly constructive but limited approach that focuses on improving existing waste systems rather than fundamentally reducing plastic consumption and production. Commitments to work with local authorities to improve recycling rates, expand reuse facilities and keep more recycling processing in Scotland are steps in the right direction, but they largely rely on incremental improvement rather than setting clear national reuse or waste‑reduction targets. Measures to tackle litter through rolling out the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) and introducing a small charge for single‑use takeaway cups are welcome and proven to change behaviour, though their impact will be constrained without stronger action on upstream packaging design and volume. Efforts to reduce the destruction of unsold goods and redirect them to charities and redistribution schemes are positive from both social justice and waste‑prevention perspectives, but remain voluntary in nature and fall short of firm regulatory requirements on producers and retailers. Overall, the offer supports a greener, fairer waste system, but stops short of the systemic shift towards a fully circular economy that would meaningfully reduce dependency on single‑use materials and virgin resources.  

Read The Labour Party’s Manifesto 

Scottish Liberal Democrats

Plastic:

• Setting out a clear, detailed and stable roadmap to net zero, giving businesses the confidence to invest.
• Embrace the circular economy and reduce waste, learning the lessons of the Scottish Government’s botched Deposit Return Scheme and fake landfill ban. Cut down our throwaway culture, tackle plastic pollution and reduce waste by: 1. Wherever possible, phasing out the use of problematic non-recyclable non-essential single-use plastics and replacing them with affordable alternatives. 2. Supporting initiatives that both extend the life of products and help with the cost of living through repair, reuse and repurposing. 3. Introducing a charge on single-use coffee cups. 4. Working with the UK Government to introduce a deposit return scheme for food and drink bottles and containers, learning the lessons from the botched SNP/Green scheme. 5. Formally requesting that the National Crime Agency make serious waste crime a priority, helping tackle organised crime. 6. Double the fixed penalty for littering and introduce a new restitution order to tackle fly tipping by making offenders pay for the clean-up of dumped waste with fines that are reflective of the damage the polluter causes.

Sewage:

• Introduce a Clean Water Act to take the sewage scandal seriously, track down and report every sewage dump, and replace outdated standards with modern enforceable regulation.
• Tackle sewage dumping and introduce a Clean Water Act by: 1. Replacing outdated sewage standards, moving towards monitoring 100% of sewage overflows so every dump is monitored and recorded and setting long-term reduction targets. 2. Supporting means to rainproof communities and slow the flow of water through the landscape to reduce sewage and flooding, including through blue-green infrastructure, the use of permeable materials, pollinator-friendly living roofs and sustainable drainage systems for buildings. 3. Modernising outdated rules and monitoring for bathing waters so that they cover all users, all year round, and open a route for community groups to request monitoring prior to an event. 4. Bringing in the ban on the sale and supply of wet wipes containing plastic, and request that the UK Government improves labelling of other sanitary products to stop them entering the sewage system. 5. Create river catchment plans in partnership with landowners and farmers, as set out in chapter 14, and review the Bellwin Scheme so it is fit for purpose when flooding occurs.

The Scottish Liberal Democrats place a strong emphasis on reducing waste and shifting away from throwaway culture. Their commitment to phase out problematic, non-recyclable, non-essential single‑use plastics aligns well with what is needed to tackle plastic pollution at source – though the lack of a clear timeline or scope weakens its impact. They also support repair, reuse and repurposing initiatives, which is welcome and consistent with moving towards a circular economy, particularly where this helps address the cost‑of‑living crisis. Introducing a charge on single‑use coffee cups would be a meaningful step to curb unnecessary waste, building on evidence that charges can successfully reduce consumption. However, while the party backs a deposit return scheme (DRS), they propose doing so in partnership with the UK Government and explicitly reference the “botched” Scottish scheme. This suggests a more cautious approach, but risks delaying urgently needed action. Given that DRS schemes elsewhere have proven effective at reducing litter and increasing recycling, any delay could undermine progress.

On enforcement, the Lib Dems propose doubling fixed penalties for littering, introducing restitution orders for fly tipping, and treating serious waste crime as a National Crime Agency priority. Stronger enforcement is badly needed, and these measures could help tackle chronic pollution – though tougher penalties alone will not address plastic production or upstream sources without parallel reduction targets. Overall, we welcome the Lib Dems’ plastic commitments which show many of the right ingredients – reduction, reuse, and enforcement – but would like to see more timebound clarity as to how they will turn off the plastic tap.

The Scottish Liberal Democrats frame sewage pollution as a scandal that requires a new Clean Water Act, which is a strong starting point. Committing to replace outdated sewage standards and move towards monitoring 100% of sewage overflows would represent a major step forward for transparency and accountability, especially if data is made publicly accessible. Their focus on long‑term reduction targets is welcome, though the absence of interim targets or deadlines leaves uncertainty over how quickly harm would be reduced. Monitoring without firm reduction commitments risks normalising pollution rather than ending it.

The party also proposes practical, nature‑based solutions to reduce sewage spills and flooding, including blue‑green infrastructure, permeable surfaces, sustainable drainage systems, and living roofs. These measures are essential for building climate‑resilient communities and tackling the root causes of combined sewer overflows, and their inclusion is a clear strength. Modernising bathing water rules to reflect year‑round use and allow community‑requested monitoring would close a significant regulatory gap and empower local groups. The proposed ban on plastic‑containing wet wipes (and improved labelling of sanitary products) would also help reduce blockages and sewage-related pollution, a measure SAS has long called for. Finally, catchment-based river management plans and reform of the Bellwin Scheme recognise the links between land use, flooding, and sewage pollution, though again the proposals would benefit from clearer delivery mechanisms and funding commitments.

We welcome the Lib Dems approach to tackling sewage pollution but their challenge will be turning strong principles – particularly full monitoring and a Clean Water Act – into enforceable action that delivers rapid and measurable reductions in sewage dumping.

Read Scottish Liberal Democrats Manifesto 

Final Thoughts

Across Scotland, it’s clear that while many sewage and water-quality commitments remain incomplete or not yet fully detailed, there is growing recognition across parties that urgent action on our rivers, lochs, coasts and blue spaces is needed. Public pressure on sewage, pollution and plastic has never been stronger – and it’s already shaping political conversations. 

Most parties have not yet matched the full ambition set out in our SAS Scottish Election Manifesto, but the path forward is clear, achievable, and increasingly supported by communities, campaigners and environmental groups.  

We’ll keep updating this blog as more Scottish party manifestos are published and more commitments emerge. With growing public pressure, media attention, and community action, this election could become a real turning point for the health of our wild waters. 

Whether you surf, swim, paddle, wild-swim, kayak, SUP, or simply love your local river, loch or coastline – you deserve clean, thriving blue spaces, free from sewage and plastic pollution. 

For more on Scotland and the election, see the links below: 

Scottish Elections & Water Pollution – Surfers Against Sewage 

Dirty Business in Wales, Scotland & Northern Ireland – Surfers Against Sewage 

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