Eastbourne and Willingdon MP Caroline Ansell has met with a senior Southern Water official and local sea swimmers to discuss water quality following new research showing pipe misconnections by builders are a major source of pollution.
Caroline invited Toby Willison, the Director of Environment and Corporate Affairs to meet with Eastbourne Sea Swimmers on Saturday.
He went into the sea with them in bracing conditions.
The group discussed some of the issues and Toby explained 64% of spills take place because of surface runoff water overwhelming the system.
The utility is working with the local authority to address this but he also expressed concern about builders wrongly connecting sewage pipes to rainwater pipes which meant raw sewerage was then discharged.
The correct connection of pipes is a matter for Eastbourne Borough Council’s building control. The issue of misconnections, not storm overflows, was the reason why water quality off Eastbourne was downgraded from good to sufficient.
Southern Water also said rapid action was being taken around a surface runoff pipe at Granville Road. Surveys will conclude at the end of the month and then the company will move to interventions to fix the issue.
Toby also added that water quality is better now than 10 years ago.
“This was a positive meeting where I hope the swimmers really got a good idea of some of the issues and challenges we all face to ensure our seawater quality improves,” said Caroline.
“A huge amount of work is taking place around storm overflows and the government’s Blue Heart project led by East Sussex County Council to better understand how we can manage surface water in Eastbourne. We all want to see better water quality as soon as possible.
“However, the latest challenge is misconnections by builders of sewage pipes into rainwater pipes. I urge the borough council - as it leads on building control - to work closely with Southern Water to ensure these do not happen.
“All these actions will lead to improvements but it is important to explain this cannot be done overnight. If we were to ban the use of storm overflows tomorrow then sewage would be in our homes, gardens, schools and hospitals."
Moving forward, Caroline has arranged for the Eastbourne Swimmers to visit Eastbourne Water Treatment Works.
