‘Every river in this country is polluted’: how Feargal Sharkey got swept up by the clean water campaign

‘What bigger injustice is there?’ Sharkey beside the River Lea in Hertfordshire. Photograph: Richard Saker/The Guardian

Time was, people would stop Feargal Sharkey in the street to talk about the song Teenage Kicks. These days, he says, “it’s always about shite in rivers”.

The former Undertones singer, now the vocal frontman for the campaign to highlight the scandal of sewage in Britain’s inland and coastal waters, does not particularly welcome the change. “I’m really happy to get back to talking about gigs and records again as soon as anybody else is ready,” he says. But neither is he about to give up his cause. Particularly now he is winning.