Scarborough South Bay's Poor Water Quality Rating is a "Threat to Tourism"

Friday, 16 June 2023 06:00

By Matthew Pells with additional reporting from Anttoni James Numminen, Local Democracy reporter

That's the message from local councillors who have called on all the relevant agencies to focus on the problem.

Scarborough Councillors are calling for accurate measurement of the effluent emitted from the town's sea outfall pipes as part of efforts to understand why the South Bay has a poor water quality rating.

Scarborough's South Bay is currently subject to an environment agency warning against swimming due to the poor quality of the bathing water despite the nearby North Bay being rated as Excellent.

The council's Scarborough and Whitby Local Area Committee has backed a motion from Councillor Rich Maw to ask all the agencies involved to focus on the problem.

Councillor Janet Jefferson says that fifty million pounds of improvements made in 2013 have shown little impact on the bathign water quality.

That work included building a new 30 metre deep, storm water storage tank capable of holding four million litres of storm water, installing three storm water pumps capable of pumping 6,500 litres a second, five kilometres of new pipework and UV lighting at the Scarborough waste water treatment works to destroy bugs.

Councillor Jefferson wants further investigations to take place urgently.

The local area committee meeting passed Councillor Maw's motion which garnered cross-party support.

In addition, the committee is asking for a formal response on how the coastal defence works have affected the currents in the Scarborough area.

Speaking at the meeting, an officer from the Environment Agency said that “Scarborough South Bay is an example of how quite complex factors” contribute to water quality and added that schemes are planned but also noted that funding is “always a factor”.

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