Four wild swimming spots have been designated as bathing waters ahead of summer. The sites in Rutland, Devon and Suffolk will receive bathing water status from next month, the Government has announced, which means they will soon benefit from regular water-quality monitoring.
Sykes Lane Bathing Beach and Whitwell Creek at Rutland Water, Firestone Bay in Plymouth and a section of the River Deben at Waldringfield, Suffolk, will be officially designated ahead of the 2023 bathing water season. They take the total number of official bathing waters across the country to 424, the highest recorded.
The Government said the proportion of bathing waters assessed as ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ has increased from 76% to 93%, while 72% are considered ‘excellent’ compared with 51% in 2010. This is despite classification standards for bathing waters being made stricter in 2015, it claims.
