Experts warn country is in danger of becoming ‘dirty man of Europe’ as it falls to bottom of bathing water leaderboard
English swimming waters are five times more likely to be polluted than those in the EU, new research has revealed.
Experts have said that the country is in danger of becoming the “dirty man of Europe” again as it falls at the bottom of the leaderboard for bathing water which is free of bacterial contaminants.
The campaign group Best for Britain analysed the quality of bathing waters under UK and EU standards and found that across all four nations of the UK, holidaymakers are less likely to enjoy “excellent” quality waters than in the EU.
Their research found that while 64.2% of England’s bathing waters were rated excellent by the Environment Agency (EA) in 2024, 85.4% of the EU’s were excellent according to the European Environment Agency (EEA) in the same year.
