One in seven (13%) of England\u2019s bathing waters are rated as polluted, and one in 14 so polluted they are not recommended for swimming.<\/p>\n
Famous beaches including Bognor Regis, Scarborough\u2019s South Bay and Littlehaven Beach in South Shields were all rated \u201cpoor\u201d in the latest classifications<\/a> from the Environment Agency, which means they are not recommended for swimming.<\/p>\n Of 449 designated bathing sites in England, 87% meet standards for \u201cexcellent\u201d or \u201cgood\u201d classification, an improvement on 2024, and 417 bathing waters (93%), were rated \u201cexcellent\u201d, \u201cgood\u201d or \u201csufficient\u201d, representing a very slight rise on 2024\u2019s standards.<\/p>\n Last year, bathing waters were the most polluted they have been since records began in 1991. Across the country, 450 locations have bathing water status and are tested during the summer season, from May to September. Last year a record number of areas \u2013 37, or 8.2% \u2013 did not meet the minimum standards<\/a> for bathing waters and were classified as poor.<\/p>\n Rivers, lakes and seas are polluted by agricultural run-off and sewage pollution dumped by water companies. This makes up almost all of the pollution in England\u2019s waterways, but the Environment Agency has also blamed \u201cbirds and dogs\u201d for the poor results.<\/p>\n Feargal Sharkey, the former Undertones frontman and water campaigner, told the Guardian: \u201cThe EA has started this thing of blaming seagulls and blaming dogs for pooing on beaches, because if they blame water companies at all it\u2019s a failure of regulation and that\u2019s their fault, whereas they don\u2019t regulate seagulls shitting. It is an act of gross incompetence, much like its regulation of the environment, to blame seagulls for the failure of water companies.\u201d<\/p>\n The water quality at Bognor Regis, West Sussex, was also rated \u2018poor\u2019. Photograph: Martin Godwin\/The Guardian<\/p>\n Fewer waterways are likely to be granted bathing status in future. Ministers recently announced<\/a> a feasibility test on any waterway where a community is seeking a bathing water designation. If water bodies are deemed too polluted to improve to at least \u201csufficient\u201d water quality, they will not be given a designation.<\/p>\n River campaigners have said the restriction is very likely to exclude river sites from being granted bathing water status. No single stretch of river in England is in good overall health and the rivers that have bathing water status at the moment all record poor water quality as a result of sewage and agricultural pollution.<\/p>\n The UK is still using the EU\u2019s bathing water status framework to measure the quality of lakes, rivers and seas. But recent research <\/a>found England\u2019s waterways with bathing status are five times more likely to be polluted than those in the EU.<\/p>\n People swim and boat in far more waterways than are designated for bathing. A recent government analysis <\/a>of the ways that England\u2019s waterways are used for recreation found 3,347 \u201cwater recreation locations\u201d in rivers, lakes and seas around the country. The Environment Agency had previously identified 342.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The planet’s most important stories. Get all the week’s environment news – the good, the bad and the essential<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Alan Lovell, Chair of the Environment Agency, said: \u201cBathing water quality in England has improved significantly over recent decades, and this year\u2019s results show the continued impact of strong regulation, investment and partnership working.<\/p>\n \u201cBut we know there is more to do, and the new bathing water reforms will strengthen the way these much-loved places are managed.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Environment Agency is working closely with Defra to ensure these changes are implemented effectively whilst our teams continue to work with water companies, farmers, councils and local groups to tackle all sources of pollution and support continued progress across sites.\u201d<\/p>\n The water minister, Emma Hardy, said: \u201cOur bathing waters are at the heart of so many communities, and these reforms will help people experience the benefits of our beautiful waters and connect with nature.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One in seven (13%) of England\u2019s bathing waters are rated as polluted, and one in 14 so polluted…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283029,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-283028","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283028"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283028\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}