EA Emergency hotline number

On the EA's website there is an emergency hotline number quoted - '0800 807606 To report pollution,fish kills and illegal fishing activity'. Has anybody actually used this number, with regards, in particular, to illegal fishing activity, and if so, has anything ever been done about your report? I am asking after having read the 'Immigrant' thread (fishing for Carp with trebles and then taking them away). Should the first port of call in that example have been to phone the hotline number and would anything have been done ?

Yes Wayne, I have used it.
What happens is, you give the operator your name and address, (to show this is not a hoax call) an dthe details of what you have witnessed and where. Give as much information as you can ie descriptions, how many people, any car reg numbers, but that is not essential.
The operator will then tell you that they will phone for any bailiffs near that area.

You must ask the operator to give you any feed back on any actions that were taken.
Also ask for the operators name.
This is so that you can ask questions at a later date if you have ha dno feed back.

On the subject of anything being done, is a matter of manpower availiable at the time. All local bailiffs could be on a fish kill or pollution incident somewhere else.

All information that you give them, will be in the strictest of confidences. They are allways worth ringing.

I have had some success with the Hotline Number. Never be afraid to use it.
You might be unsure yourself, but somebody else could have rang with the same complaint. Two complaints are better than one. One complaint is better than none.

I have used a number for the EA I think it was/used to be 0800 887766 or something similar!

There is a brook by ours, cat E in terms of water quality, which means virtually nothing lives in there, anyways 1 day I am out running along said brook, when I see oil coming in from an outflow pipe, straight on phone to ea, within an hour an officer is on the scene.

Top Drawer!

I used the EA number 0870 807060 to report a funny brown coloured foamy scum entering one of my gravel pits. It was the Stanton Harcourt pit belonging to one of the local Oxford colleges that Peter Stone used to fish years ago when trying to catch 7lb chub and also caught double figure Tench. The company my wife works for are building a massive bloody carbunkle of a warehouse beside the lake and this carp was running from the footings into the lake. Phoned the hotline, got passed through to someone within 2 minutes who informed me that they were well aware of the situation. They had already been to monitor and test the ph levels and there was 'nothing' to worry about. No sign of anything untoward since with the fish or bird population so job done I suppose....