On Friday there were eleven beaches along the English coast where swimming was strongly discouraged. Swimming in the water at Dunkirk was also discouraged on Friday. The poop bacterium E.coli was found in the water. It comes from the United Kingdom. As soon as water treatment stations threaten to overflow there, pipes divert the raw water to rivers and the sea. Last year, more than 5,000 incidents were reported in hundreds of locations. That number is increasing every year. Last year, an increase of 89 percent was even recorded.
Increase
The spectacular increase is the result of savings made by the environmental inspectorate to combat the discharges. The competent environment minister was Liz Truss. Greenpeace therefore did not mince words when the figures were leaked this week: “Truss has shit on her hands.”
The problem mainly occurs when it is pouring rain. This is partly due to the drought, which means that the hard soil mainly drains water and hardly absorbs it. Due to the warming of the climate, precipitation is becoming more extreme and flooding is increasing. The biggest problem, however, is the hopelessly outdated infrastructure in the UK’s sewerage system. In three decades hardly any investment has been made in new sewers or water reservoirs.
The French have really had it now. According to them, the overflowing British cesspool now also threatens their fisheries and their beaches along the Channel and the North Sea. They ask the European Commission to take immediate legal action.