A water company has been fined thousands of pounds after leaking sewage into the River Medway.

Southern Water was fined £2,000 and ordered to pay £1,305 in costs after pleading guilty to allowing unlawful levels of sewage escape their treatment plant at Motney Hill, Rainham.

The Environment Agency took 25 samples and discovered four breaches between June 2006 and March last year.

Chatham Magistrates heard that in one sample the level of suspended solids was nine times the allowed limit.

Peter Bilbrough, prosecuting, said:"All those handling polluting or potentially polluting material are expected to take care there is no risk to the environment.

"The defendant company were already given a tolerance allowing for some discharges above consent and had notice from the Agency that they were failing during the year.

"Despite that they failed to prevent more than the permitted number of failures."

Southern Water apologised and said all but one of the breaches had occurred while an £8.4m improvement scheme was being built.

The court was also told that there had been no breaches since works had been completed.

Southern Water could have been fined as much as £20,000 but magistrates decided to be lenient due to the cost of the improvement works and the low-level impact on the environment.