Toxic Water Review – A shocking story of greed, incompetence and Britain’s largest mass poisoning | television

IIt has become a cliché to liken television dramas and case-based documentaries to Mr. Bates vs. the Post Office. However, you get the sense that Poison Water hopes to do for communities affected by the water industry’s shocking inaction what ITV’s hit show did for postmasters wrongly criminalized by software glitches. It’s a one-off film, telling the story of Britain’s largest mass poisoning and the apparent greed and incompetence that has meant it has loomed large in the lives of the victims ever since. There are also parallels with the recent drama Toxic Town, the ongoing fight for those affected by toxic waste in Corby in Northamptonshire.

We open our story in the summer of 1988, when residents in several towns and villages in North Cornwall noticed something strange about the water coming out of their taps. It is blue in some cases, black in others, and can be gelatinous or sticky. It was also accompanied by a rapid outbreak of ill health, from vomiting and diarrhea to rashes, blisters and severe headaches. For some, the effects were temporary, but many people continued to suffer long-term health problems, and there were even premature deaths that families are convinced were caused by the water they drank and bathed in that summer. Water that – due to a fault in the treatment facility – was filled with toxic amounts of aluminum sulfate. It will take more than two weeks for those in power to admit there is a problem. Meanwhile, residents have been told that the water is completely safe and should be mixed with orange squash to improve the taste.

Carol White, a resident of the quiet village of St. Minver, says she doesn’t want to talk about the poisoning again. Thank goodness she changed her mind, as she quickly became one of the most outspoken interviewees on the show. There is awkward comedy, with White urging the makers not to edit it out as they did an episode of BBC’s Horizon at the time, and to keep the “good bits”. Things quickly become less fun, as she explains what she wants to keep. “Miscarriage of justice, I want that… Before I die, I want that truth to come out.” As we have learned, there has been little justice indeed – other than a government apology – with calls for a public inquiry remaining unanswered in the intervening years.

Poison Water relies heavily on the Horizon episode and other archival material, and there’s a risk that the final product will look more like a repackaging than an original piece. However, stepping back from events four decades naturally casts them in a different light. And there are enough new interviews here—with residents, experts, and politicians—to bring the whole matter startlingly and disconcertingly into the present. Among those interviewed was Michael Howard, who was then Minister for Water and Planning under Margaret Thatcher. He was shown a letter obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, in which a Water Inspectorate employee urged the government to go easy on the whole matter, fearing that prosecutions would “make the whole water industry unattractive to the city” (this was at a time when the government was preparing to privatize the water industry). Howard says he’s not sure he ever saw the letter. He adds: “I hope you confirm that this happened a long time ago and I can’t remember.” He strongly denies any suggestion of a cover-up or collusion, calling it a “huge mistake that should never have happened.”

However, there are many people who remember that time well, and whose lives were permanently changed because of it. In addition to White – who has had a number of health problems since then – we meet Doug Cross, a scientist who was well placed to understand what was unfolding in his hometown, Camelford, and who from the beginning tried to hold the authorities to account. His wife, Carol, died in 2004 when she was 59, after suffering a sudden onset of Alzheimer’s symptoms. Post-mortem tests showed that she had extremely high levels of aluminum in her brain. As a scientist, Cross realizes that there is no conclusive evidence that the accident caused his wife’s dementia. But there was also no effort made to try to find out whether this had happened, or how it had actually affected the 20,000 people whose water supplies were contaminated.

Leslie Nix, then chief operating officer of the Southwest Water Authority, says he couldn’t bear the idea of ​​airing the program without someone who knew what was happening talking about it. Now, he says, “he just wants to know the truth.” We can only hope that those in power will finally listen.