'Dirty' beach faces bleak future

Colette Hume
BBC News, Pembrokeshire

The annual Good Beach Guide shows the number of beaches with excellent water quality has fallen by 10% since last year, the biggest drop in 21 years. Being omitted from the guide can be a big blow to an area reliant on tourism.

With its long sandy beach, Amroth in Pembrokeshire is popular with local people and visitors alike.

Amroth relies on the summer trade from visitors

But the news that Amroth has failed the stringent water tests has come as bitter blow, especially to the owners of the cafes, shops and pubs which rely on its good reputation to bring in the vital summer trade.

In the village pub, Amroth Arms, there is a crowd of regulars in the bar.

News of its failure to make this year's Good Beach Guide is the only topic of conversation.

'Devastated'

Roger Harris is the landlord and a community councillor.

He said the beach and its clean water were a huge draw for visitors and without them, the future for businesses in the village was bleak.

"We live on basically a summer trade - it's only three months, four months of the year, without that the businesses are going to go the wall.

People here are devastated - it's terrible, really terrible Roger Harris, landlord

"People here are devastated. It's terrible, really terrible."

The reason this beach has failed is simple.

The frustration for local people is that there is nothing they can do to prevent it happening.

Last summer saw the worst flooding in living memory. Huge swathes of the country were left under water and those floodwaters polluted the rivers and eventually the beaches.

Here in Amroth people remembered the summer of heavy rain well. It has left them a bitter legacy.

Like beaches up and down the country, Amroth is tested regularly.

'Abnormal impact'

Rod Thomas monitors this stretch of coastline for the Environment Agency.

He told me a set of water testing dates are agreed every year - they are completely random.

Unfortunately for Amroth, a random test was scheduled just days after the worst of that bad weather. The pollution showed up on the tests.

Many people living in the village say that test should have been discounted. They say the freak weather has had an abnormal impact on water quality readings.

Rod told me: "They're right. It was taken after extremely heavy rainfall but not within the parameters which we could get it discounted. The sample has to stay."

He has worked in this area of West Wales for more than 15 years and he knows it well.

He acknowledges the frustration felt by villages about the strict rules the Environment Agency must abide by.

After we had finished filming, he took us to a stream nearby. Deep in the clear cold waters we could see brown trout. “It's a really good sign,“ he told me.

'Frustrated and angry'

Eddie Davies runs the Pirate café. It is just metres from the beach and on a sunny day lunch on his terrace overlooking the sea is on many visitors' agenda.

He has spent this week gearing up for what he is hoping will be a busy Bank Holiday weekend. He is frustrated and angry that one test could potentially have such a massive impact on his livelihood.

"It's just one test - everyone here knows this beach and its water are clean. It doesn't seem right that one sample taken after all that really bad weather should make such an impact."

What people really don't know - and what they need to know is that they really shouldn't swim within 24 hours at least of very heavy rainfall or flooding Gill Bell, of the Marine Conservation Society

So this year Amroth will not be included in the Good Beach Guide.

It has been removed from its list of recommended places to swim. The guide is produced by the Marine Conservation Society. Thomas Bell from the MCS says this year's result buck the trend of cleaner bathing water.

"Heavy rain sweeps pollutants like raw sewage, street debris and animal waste directly from the land into rivers and the sea.

"Not all beaches are affected but the problem for swimmers is knowing when and where this has happened."

Down on the beach I met his colleague, Gill Bell.

She said there was huge disappointment about the rise in the number of failing beaches. She is worried that with many experts predicting more wet weather, pollution could become an even greater problem. But her biggest concern was for swimmers.

"What people really don't know - and what they need to know is that they really shouldn't swim within 24 hours at least of very heavy rainfall or flooding.

"There is a real chance they could find themselves in heavily polluted water. Poor quality water carries real health risks.”

The guide is published this morning and there is some good news.

A total of 443 beaches are being recommended - that's still more than double the number listed by the guide in 2000 - a figure the MCS says reflects the £20billion investment by the water industry to improve water quality.

But that is of little comfort to Amroth.