A UK Government minister risked “misleading the public” with claims about Scotland’s water being more polluted than England’s, according to the UK Statistics Authority.

Steve Reed said that “pollution levels in Scotland are worse than they are in England” during a TV interview in July.

Reed then made a bid on social media to back-up his claims, which he made repeatedly in the House of Commons, as well as in broadcast interviews and online.

He was UK environment secretary at the time but is now in charge of housing and local government.

The Scottish Government said Reed’s claims were “inaccurate and misleading”, which has been backed up by the UK’s independent statistics authority on Wednesday.

The authority’s regulation committee, which oversees the Office for Statistics Regulation (O

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