UK's DIRTIEST BEACH! We were shocked!
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- Опубликовано: 30 июл 2024
- One of our beautiful local beaches had been named as the DIRTIEST BEACH for swimming in the UK. We were shocked!
We wanted to take a look for ourselves and, with feet on the ground, find some answers and any evidence of the problem. Is this award deserved? With sky high water charges, why have we got one of the dirtiest beaches? Is South West Water to blame? Has anything been done to remedy the situation?
Join us as we explore the area and you may be shocked by the outcome!
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We are Sarah and Andrew and we film around Cornwall and publish on RUclips, usually weekly. Sometimes we stay in accommodation in Cornwall and upload our vlog. Sarah is fascinated by sea glass and likes to collect it so there may be the occasional sea glass video too. The channel is a hobby and we both have normal day jobs!
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There are several reasons why so many beaches are such an appalling state. A) The privatised water companies are more interested in rewarding their shareholders than investing in facilities to treat sewage. They discharge millions of litres of untreated sewage into rivers, lakes and seas each year, little wonder so many of our beaches, rivers and lakes are in such an appalling state; B) Ofwat fail to do their job properly; probably due to underfunding. C) The Environment Agency do not have enough staff to manage our environment. Fewer and fewer staff are having to cope with massively increasing workloads. I’m afraid it’s symptomatic of the decline that has taken place in the UK over the past couple of decades. We really must start holding the directors of these companies personally liable and prosecute them. When companies are fined all they do is pass on the cost of that to customers. Animal poo is, of course, a problem, but that’s again about lack of enforcement. If we want decent public health services then we have to be prepared to fund them properly.
Privatization just opened the door to foreign owners having absolute control over our major utilities
And of course the Tories, who facilitated all this! Thank goodness they're out now, and that Cornwall has turned a mixture of red and yellow. Pity there's not a Green seat among them though! 😏
As for Starmer, he is too much of a coward and a wet girl's blouse to properly nationalise the water industry. So I can't say how much things will improve! 😏
@@Daisy-tl2lh💯👍 Correct! So the only remedy is to re-nationalise!
@@oneoflokis fine when we have politicians we can trust to have the right people in the top jobs otherwide nepotism reigns .. right now I have no idea what is the remedy but it is neither foreign oligark ownership nor nationalisation???
I fish inshore along this coast and very often on a calm day you sit for hours surrounded by
unscreened sewerage. thank aALL MP's for this as they voted for more release by water
company's of raw sewerage into rivers and the sea. I dont recall sheep producing brown cigars,
which float past the boat. I'm not surprised that farms have been blamed as there is a constant attack
on farming. There are 58 raw serage outfalls in Cornwall 26 at Sea, 32 to Esturies.
Interesting! 😏👍
It never used to be like this untreated sewage all over uk destroying the coast and tourist industry
with nearly all British utilities owned by foreign individuals and corporations abroad what do they care about us, our country and our wildlife and our politicians have allowed it to happen so long as the money comes rolling in
If the companies are foreign-owned then money won't be coming in, it will actually be leaving the country. Money might be coming into the personal bank accounts of individual politicians but the country as a whole will be losing money.
OMG, I spent a few days in June 2023 at Porthluney beach splashing around in the water near the drain run off and swimming in the sea. I had NO idea how bad the water was but I DID notice how brown it looked coming out of the run off drain to the left of the beach. Thank you for bringing this to our notice. I think the Carhayes estate are a disgrace what with their greedy parking charges and ANPR.
Thank you for telling us about this beach. That is the Posh side of Cornwall!
Hello Sarah and Andrew. We're staying in Porthleven and have been binge watching your videos! We did the Helford walk, along Frenchman's creek and found that tiny shrine to St Francis. Today we're off to Helston to sample the ale that Andrew recommended. We live in Somerset but watch your videos every week!
What's strange is the spike in June and July when you'd expect there to be less rain as opposed to more and thus less agricultural run-off?
If one beach has the brown flag, then they all should. There is only one sea that washes into Cornwall! Surfers have been complaining about it since before we moved from Cornwall over 15 years ago! Privatised water companies don't work! Same as railways etc.
💯
SW water in trouble in Devon yesterday for causing very bad stomach bugs in locals too.
Also C.Castle could really do with spending some of the money( from car parks?) And other tourist income on updating the out of date loos. I would actually prefer animal poo at least they only eat grass.
need to look into who is owning our utilities ... what do they care if a few customers die of cholera ...
The government passed a law allowing water companies to do this.
That's because they bribed them, oh, sorry, I meant gave nice big donations.
All big companies do, that's how our world works, politicians in the pockets of the mega rich.
Absolutely disgusting! It’s not a joke, nothing to be giggling about.
That law has always been in place under both labour and Conservatives
@@stormy3446 Nope. The CON government - 292 MPS incl Rishi and the rest- voted for 15 years of sewage dumping in Jan 2023. They adjusted the target enabling unlimited sewage. No control of water companies.
Everywhere is beautiful until humans show up
Nonesense.
@@barleyarrishAn exaggeration maybe, but certainly not nonsense. You need to visit some of the British beaches after spells of hot weather and witness the huge amounts of rubbish that visitors make absolutely no effort to clear up or take away with them. As for the bacteria, again it’s a serious problem, but in this case it’s due to the lack of investment in sewage treatment.
@@buzzukfiftythree You can not tar all Humans with the same brush. The majority do not make a mess. It is a small percentage that despoil and leave crap everywhere they go.
@@buzzukfiftythree I live West Penwith andI am surrounded by Tourest Beaches, and I spend a lot of time by and on the Sea. I don't see these piles of rubbish, a small minority leave their rubbish behind and they have always done this, but the great majority of Humanity are not like this at all.
MP's a few years ago voted to allow more Raw untreated sewage to be relaesed into Rivers and the Sea, increased house building has exacerbated the problem.
With the huge increase in population its hardly surprising the infrastructure cannot cope housing the NHS
Given the volume of waste water overflows or deliberate discharges which are the responsibility of these privately owned water companies, virtually every beach in Southern UK would be impacted with human waste. Dumping untreated wastewater saves these companies time and money.
Often there is no basic straining of the material, and we know a lot of people don't consider what they flush.
Objects such as synthetic face wipes, condoms, tampons, wound dressings, band aids, tea leaves, vegetable peelings, even cooking oils enter the system.
So some of the plastic waste on beaches comes directly from the waste water.
The issue of plastic in the environment is growing exponentially. Particle sizes as they are ground down blend in with sand, shell grit and coral rubble.
And its entering our food chain.
The excuses from the companies and the public bodies meant to regulate them is always the same.
They spend "x" amount of money, but "it's complicated".
You couldn't have chosen a more topical subject than today's video with all the main news today being centred on the outbreak of contamination in the water system in the Devon area. Couldn't have timed it better to release your version of the sewage down in Porthluney. Such a beautiful area too & a Poldark connection with Caerhays Castle. Andrew in fine form today with every Poo pun in the book! As you say Sarah, not funny really, but an important subject made a little easier with Andrew's lighthearted version of it. 👍x J x
how many millions of new englishmen into our country doing an average of 10 fllushed a day the majority of it ending up in our seas as raw sewage ... I live by the sea with a constant pong of sewage drifting in on the evening breeze ...
Hi Sarah and Andrew, This is a very good review of the situation at Poo Beach !!! the assessment is not really fate as you say through the lack of research etc. Really good you are reviewing these things along with the best of Cornwall. All the best Bob
It should be taken over the National Trust , to clean up beach .
we visited here last year, it was so beautiful had a lovely coffee in the cafe and sat on the benches slightly elevated on the right of the toilets, who would of thought it was dirty I am shocked x
Hi guys, we so enjoy watching your videos of our old home. We live in Australia now. Just a comment to say on most beaches here in Oz there are permanent signs saying don't swim for three days after heavy rain. Maybe it's something for the various councils in England to consider?!?!
Looks like we are all going to Skegness then.
You raise a very interesting point with this video.
It is certainly a case that known sewage discharges into our coastal waters is impacting significantly on inshore water quality, it needs to be remembered that such discharges need not be in the immediate vicinity of a polluted beach. It is quite possible for a discharge to be carried some distance by marine currents and so pollute remote coastal waters.
However, the matter of field runoff is rarely mentioned, yet can be a significant factor. Those of us that live in rural areas see it all too often when high rainfall flushes out of the fields and blocks road drainage and ditches. Ironically, animal waste associated with normal grazing may not actually be too significant if all you have is a few sheep.
The issue that concerns me is with the farms that employ intensive practices (much more common in modern farming). They put far fewer animals onto the land and, as a result, have to collect the associated slurry. They then, typically, dispose of this by spreading onto the fields that once would have been populated by grazing animals. This is generally accepted practice as it encourages better grass which is then cropped for fodder for those same livestock. This sounds sensible at face value and can be argued, overall, to have the same impact on the land in the “soil to grass to fodder to livestock to processed fodder back to soil” cycle. The down side, as I see it, is that the slurry is collected over an extended period before being spread quite “thickly” at sporadic intervals. If we get a major rainfall shortly after the spreading, it seems hardly surprising if a lot of this slurry then rapidly washes off the land and straight into the water courses. Strange that so many of our rivers are experiencing phosphate problems.
If you were to extend your investigation into the water catchment zone of this stream and beach, it would be interesting to see if there were such farms operating somewhere along the 13km length you identified.
As an example, in our Somerset parish with a history biased towards dairy farming, we now do not have a single cow in any fields … yet the agriculture remains, fundamentally, dairy. The old meadows are cropped for grass silage as fodder for the same cows that no longer have to stand around in the rain! Strangely, our local river has a phosphate problem, nicely exacerbated by frequent raw sewage discharges from the local pumping station 😢.
Don't cows like standing in a field eating fresh grass?
I remember taking my two young boys to the beach for the first time. They were so excited! But when we got there, there was never a metre gap between each human poo!!! Ayr Scotland!
Vital info guys - I’ve shared with family & friends
Another awesome job like and shared out in you tube community .
Great video. thank you. xx
It’s may be worth adding.. the locals also call this beach Caerhays beach and not porth Luney. So if you are on holiday in this wonderful country and ask for a nice beach to visit be warned. J
The problem is the beaches that are not tested or designated as bathing beaches. (Including one you reported on recently.)
Such a brilliant CWT investigation! It wouldn't have occur to me increases in rain/run-off water in recent years from farm ruminants was the cause. So really it's natural farmland drainage into the stream leading into the cove that's bringing in the contamination. The only way to reduce the problem would be to restrict animal numbers on coastal farms or have a water-treatment (purification) plant interrupting the stream ahead of the cove, both solutions beset with problems of implemenation I guess. Yes. totally agree, there should be clear notices on the beach itself advising against bathing (not a poo sign though!). BTW, Porth Luney beach is still stunningly beautiful! :)
Beautiful to look at, but there’s no way you’d get me paddling or swimming in it. Sadly that’s true of most UK beaches nowadays to a lesser or greater degree.
At Barry Island today, people were tannoyed out of the water due to poor water quality, risk to health. Place was full, lots in the sea until a 4pm tannoy called everyone to leave the water. Ugh!
Sorry Sarah and Andrew, didn't watch all of your video today as Friday is our "cake treat day" and as my son and myself usually watch you at lunchtime, . . . . . . Well, will say no more, but thank you for taking us to that lovely part of the county. Looking forward to next weeks. 💕
Thankyou , a great video! 🥰🇬🇧
Very interesting video this week ,I have spent quite a bit of time on Porth luny over the years ,and have always loved the beach ,the only draw back that we found is that weaver fish are usually present 😱my son had a very nasty experience with one ,but that was quite a while ago ,you both excelled yourselves with the puns this week 😂😂well done ,looking forward to next week
I believe the weaver fish enjoy that sewage! 😏
I thought you were going to say Looe! 🤪😂
Thanks. Informative and fun
Very amusing 😁 although you’re right, there is a serious side to this issue but good on you both, you did get to the bottom of this problem
That's not nice, but there are ways to remedy the situation. We have a barbecue hut in the forest with a plant-based sewage treatment plant. The sewage treatment plant wasn't cheap, but it keeps the forest and the environment clean. There are also larger plants like this for small villages, the only disadvantage is that they sometimes smell a bit strong. The investment would quickly pay for itself with the number of tourists. Best wishes from Günter
Great video with lots of poo puns😂 I've been wondering if there's poo at Looe😂
Better send for the Poo Fighters!
especially to their public loos! I wouldnt like my children to use them or myself...
Duporth beach is where some ladies were winter swimming and saw turds , not far from Porthluney.Yet that beach has 3 stars.I am not sure the results are reliable because they don’t do all year testing and it may be a very wet spell when they do it.
If the main source of the problem is animal poo from the run off caused by rain, then this year the figures will go stratospheric due to almost six months of solid rain.
I live 30 minutes from St Anne’s and Blackpool, we had a brown flag award, certainly don’t swim in that, quite shocking that Cornwall has one, I hope it gets sorted out at some point. ❤️❤️
You two are very funny, when your not looking for celebs houses you're monitoring the beach for floaters! Keep up the good work!
The sign at the entrance to the car park is next to pointless really. There needs to be clear signage at all entry points from the car park to the beach stating the water is a health hazard and unsafe for bathing.
They wanna take a look at the Water at Newlyn. I had a cut on my arm which spread into a streptococcus infection that tried to eat my wrist.😂
you could join up with the chap who travels our towns across the UK and lists the worst Turdtowns, i believe St. Austell holds that honour
Someone rated Falmouth the worst town in England the other week. I must say that when it comes to Cornwall, they've got a cheek!
Love the puns starting at 4:13 😂 could have said “incase their business goes down the ‘🚽’” instead of PAN
I'm really " Browned off" watching this!😢
Hey guys! (Great walking/town videos BTW. 🙂👍)
I've just looked up and found out the Cornish word for "shit"! 💩😂 It's "kawgh"! (Pronounced like the English word "cow" but with a "ch" sound like the Scottish "Loch" at the end!) I speak German as one of my languages, so can say it easily. 🙂
Whether there is a milder Cornish word to correspond to "poo" I cannot say. 🤷♀️
Anyway. Poo Beach = Porth Kawgh! 😂👍👍
If the EA report is correct and ruminate poo is the cause could it be that one or two unscrupulous farmers upstream are taking advantage of heavy rain to empty slurry storage tanks into the stream? It was a particularly wet summer last year and a few farmers in my area (Welsh Borders) are known to have done this into the river Wye and its tributaries.😡
15:07 some septic tanks connecting to a soakaway which means they go into the ground
That was surely just the chocolate ice-cream fallen from a Neopolitan ice cream 😅
Love the videos -thanks
Looks like they’re going to need a bigger Alice Pooper Scooper.
Farming methods haven't significantly changed for some time, so maybe that may not be enough on it's own. More heavy rainfall events in recent years as climate change takes hold won't help, but UK standards have been loosened since we left the EU. Could that be a more significant factor?
Cutting ditches around the bottom ends of the grazing fields would catch the feaces during rainy season and naturally filter the water.
I suppose it's inevitable with farms with cows and sheep near by and the amount of downpours we get down here 🤷. Par for the cause I suppose sadly 😝. Let's hope they can sort it out somehow 🙏. I think people should definitely be warned if a beach has been affected though don't you 🙄. Great video as usual and thanks for making a grim fact humorous 😜🙏💖😘
I agree with you both, embarrassed and feel disappointed with this brown flag. We have had so much rain. My local beach in Portreath is having issues with overflows. Let’s hope we can sort this out xx thank you for highlighting issues ❤
If the sea water quality was good in 2019, then something has changed since then, surely ? Are the farmers, or the estate itself, grazing more ruminants in that area ? If more animals are now being grazed than the local terrain can support surely the responsibility must lie with those putting the extra animals on the land ? I don't mean to bash the farmers (sorry farmers) but the responsibility for the deterioration in water quality must lie somewhere. Let's be honest Britain has always had rainy weather so it can't be that - can it ?
Surfers against sewerage have been on the case for a very long time pre 2019
Pooey Lewis and the news - That's the power of Poo😂😂😂
It doesn't explain why it peaks in holiday season though.
There is a problem in the UK with broken underground sewerage pipes. One of the ideas behind privatisation was that the companies would replace these pipes. This never happened. The leakages from these broken pipes go into the ground and seep down into the rivers. Thus explaining the rise in the summer months when tourist numbers increase.
@@simonrangeleyShame! 😟
Problem is, most of the ‘idyllic’ fishing villages that attracted mass tourism in the 19th century and spurred the development of hotels and attractions discharged sewage straight into the sea. And still do. Post WW2 there was a massive property development to these areas as people retired to the coast. This pressure is ceaseless as more move to the coast to WFH. Geographically it is not feasible to hook these sewer pipes to a network sewerage treatment plant. So it all goes into the sea.
Why is it not feasible?
Sad. Its a beautiful beach! Andrew is hilarious!
Very interesting video about an important issue. I just don’t know why with scientific advancements that this issue can’t be prevented especially with the increased intensity of rainfall we get now. Oh and impressive range of poo puns….😂!!!
What a load of Poo That was, Only Joking Both. great content as always👍👍👍
South west water should be fined hundreds 😂they even have mad half of Brixham Devon sick
Billions.
@@Mrgingerdread1💯
Can’t watch this having just had my breakfast, I remember some beaches looking pretty horrendous on the East Coast in the 60’s …..surely the changing tides don’t just choose one particular beach to spew up its vile contents, I also remember not so long ago holidaying in Devon children playing amongst sewage along the sea shore, one commenter hit the nail on the head, ‘Everywhere was beautiful until humans appeared! be with you next week Sarah & Andrew 🤗ps hope you didn’t have your faithful friends with you 🥴
Always used to go to this beach with my kids, so very sad that our water is so bad quality. One thing I want to say though, if it’s the farm animals to blame, wouldn’t the water quality be bad all year round 🤔
Hmmm. I am not so sure its that simple.
Half the beaches of Devon and Cornwall are at the end of a Combe or valley with a stream feeding onto the beach.
The West Country has always had a high precipitation - nothing changed there.
Animals have been farmed on the land with their excrement fertilizing the soil, since long before anyone had the idea of 'beach culture/Holidays.....pretty much the Victorians 'invented' sitting on beaches as a pastime and swimming in the sea. So why the problem now?
My suspicion is that either there is slurry pit leaching into the river further upstream, or the septic tank isn't maintained at the public toilets....or worse, the local water company is up to something, further away still.
I have heard many stories of dogs getting sick after drinking freshwater in streams heading onto the beach....on many Blue Beaches too!
So the powers that be say it,s the farm animals again ?
so when we visit these places, what do the farm animals use " condoms, and sanitary goods for eh?
their keeping something from us for sure??? 🤫🤫💩💩......
Unfortunately that’s the water companies doing.
It's all those children pooing in the sea 😂
Alone the coast here at lovely ole Hastings the sea always looks like a sewer swell. I never swim in it. They let sewage out to sea here still. Should be made illegal and ALL SEWAGE treated inland and not pumped out to sea.
💯
It is the same in Devon. It is absolutely disgusting. They pay their staff huge bonuses to stay quiet as well. WHY DO WE HAVE TO PAY SOUTH WEST WATER TO TREAT OUR SEWERAGE WHEN THEY DONT DO IT. THE BEACHES ARE NOW DISGUSTING 🤢 SHIT HOLES.
You are both hilarious 😂
Well thats filth and down to the owners! Caerhays get yer finger out and clean-up, I am sure you charge enough money to visit, you must have bad plumbing/ sewage output? Surely an estate such as Caerhays could infiltrate a natural reed bed set-up to take the impure and make it pure? They should be able to afford it or buy chemical loo's which are very cheap! I feel nauseous looking at the beach and such a shame when its stunningly beautiful as is Caerhays! If its animal waste the same applies...
Just change the name to golden sands,
job done 👍
Thanks for the video guys. A very different subject and what might be tapoo, I mean taboo to some, but important to see this different side of the beach. Perhaps shouldn't have eaten my lunch whilst watching though 💩💩💩
On behalf of all your subscribers named Brian I must protest at your latest video. (Nice shirt though Andrew).
Regards
Brian
Is it going down the pan!!
And how much are the water companies putting our bills up to
Yes unfair Andrew so funny 🤣
Not sewage! That foamy stuff is just a natural phenomenon. The reviewers are quite wrong!
The Small Faeces.
Its strange calling out one beach because the sea doesnt just stay in that cove so logic says if the sea affects that it effects all beaches . Are they pumping the toilet waste out in pipe
i added the like 400 ..
I like the way my home town of southsea ranks an appropriate no.two. Now I know it realy is toilet town
Not sure but I think Iggy Plop lives near there.
Maybe Dirty Brian washes his bottom in the stream
Did you find the dinosaur responsible for the poo
Certainly LOOKS quite disgusting!
Pooie Lewis and the news😂😂😂😂😂
That video was s*!t.
Seriously, good video and saving the Slash joke till the end......
Try looking at the river Exe at Exmouth Devon river of human wast. And thay swim in it w t f
Lobbying, allowing companies to send someone to the parliament or pay a politician to change a law to suite them. Perfectly legal. Government allowing water companies to do this, saves them millions.
They won't be a flushed with the news doesn't actually mean anything it's not a pun
Flushed has several meanings. It can mean excited or elated by something, e.g. “flushed with success, I was getting into my stride", so flushed means excited. Also flushed relates to a toilet. A pun is a joke exploiting the different possible meanings of a word. Therefore not being ‘flushed with the news’ is a pun. Cheers Andrew
Don’t forget Ian dury poo poo in the prawn
No wonder it's known as that it's near St awful
More gov propaganda. If i remember right, last year around this time, wasnt the ''news'' trying to 'help' us with red emojis on the weather chart for sewage beaches??
''Stay in doors! Save lives!
I remember that chestnut too!😂😂
O god its a proper shit show and no point in suger coating it ❤
I haven't paid SWW a penny for 5 year's because of this.
The cowards cancelled my debt because I yold them if they take me to Court I would invite Wildlife Trusts and the Media to hear my complaints.
The Cowards have left me in Credit !!!!
Owned by Australian and Chinese Hedge Funds !!!!
💯💯👍👍
Maybe seeing when eating breakfast was a bad ide... First fem min was difficult hehehe
Hi Sarah and Andrew, There is one way they could stop is for people to stop eating meat and become vegetarians or the farmers put catchment ditches, Here in Kent, where i live, there is a sewage farm and in heavy rain it overflows in to the and notices go up telling people not to go in the sea and it stinks 💩very interesting video thanks.
Can you imagine how lifeless the countryside would look with no livestock grazing in the fields?
No farmer is going to keep them as 'pets' with all the associated cost and worry....not to mention the 24/7 care and maintenance!
The fields would then be used for growing vegetables and cereal crops and the subsequent glyphosates and other sprays which are generally chemical based, leaching into the water systems .
It’s human shite.I live near there.