River Cam designated bathing area would be ‘ecological disaster’

A debate has begun over whether a stretch of the River Cam should become a designated bathing area for wild swimming. A motion going before Cambridge City Council today (Thursday) proposes support for an application to grant an area of the river at Sheep’s Green designated bathing area status.

This would require an average of more than 100 bathers a day to use the river at that spot over the summer months. On one side of the fence are members of the Cam Valley Forum, who believe applying for designation would speed up Anglian Water’s work to reduce pollution in the river caused by its sewage works upstream at Haslingfield.

But environmental campaigners Friends of the River Cam and Green city councillors fear that if more swimmers are attracted to this part of the river, it could damage wildlife and put swimmers’ health at risk. Anglian Water admits that while it does intend to upgrade the sewage works at Haslingfield at some point in the future, a bathing water designation downstream of the plant would make the work a “statutory” requirement.

The site being proposed for a designated bathing area is the popular swimming stretch on council-owned land, near the Lammas Land car park, café, toilets and playground, Canoe Club, learner pool and paddling pool.

Cllr Katie Thornburrow (Lab, Petersfield) says in a motion to the council that it should support the application “recognising that designation would bring tangible benefits to the health of the river and city residents”. The motion says such a move “imposes a legal obligation on Anglian Water to reduce sewage pollution in the area concerned until the level ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ is reached, requires the Environment Agency to test the water regularly during the bathing season in order to produce an annual classification as ‘excellent’, ‘good’, ‘sufficient’ or ‘poor’, requires the local council and agencies to publish the annual water quality classification, and can help residents enjoy the benefits of wild swimming, reducing stress, and improving wellbeing, fitness and contact with nature”.

Tests of River Cam water by the Cam Valley Forum reveal that during dry weather the majority of flowing water in the river can be composed of effluent from the sewage works. If water at a designated bathing area is judged to be ‘poor’ by the Environment Agency, this could trigger funding being made available to Anglian Water by Ofwat to install disinfection equipment at the sewage works. Although having an average of 100 bathers per day is a requirement for an area to be given designated bathing area status, in reality a survey only needs to be carried out on two days a year. So it is possible that the real average across the summer months would be much lower.

A spokesperson for the Cam Valley Forum said: “Positive action by Anglian Water based on Sheep’s Green designation will undoubtedly benefit all the river downstream of Haslingfield including Grantchester Meadows and the popular Newnham Riverside Club. So, neither of these sites will lose out even though they will not have their own designation. “Worryingly, without an application for designation at Sheep’s Green, the sequence of events leading potentially to disinfection at Anglian Water’s works cannot happen. Ofwat has a procedure in place to follow, and it starts with designation. That is the reality of the regulatory position.”

However, many environmental and swimming campaigners have expressed their horror at the proposal. Susan Buckingham, on behalf of the Friends of the River Cam, said: “Sheep’s Green lies in the middle of local nature reserves: Paradise, Lammas Land and Coe Fen. An increase in bathing will damage sensitive habitat and the wildlife, inconsistent with the council’s declaration of a biodiversity emergency. “A DBA will likely result in an intensification of infrastructure, from the current small car park and narrow access road, to create income for the council from a ‘visitor destination’.”

Dani Redhead, chair of the Friends of Sheep’s Green Learner Pool, Miranda Gill, chair of the Friends of Sheep’s Green and Lammas Land, both dispute in a letter to the city council the suggestion that Anglian Water would be forced to clean up the river following a DBA. They write: “This legal obligation, as far as we can see, is not mentioned by Defra on what to expect if a site is designated. The only stipulations concern the frequency of water monitoring and the signs required to be displayed during the bathing season.” They add that the money would be much better spent on improving the Lammas Land paddling pool and learner pool at Sheep’s Green, to fix the pool heating and install changing rooms. And they raise concerns that encouraging people to swim in a polluted river would lead to health risks. “Promoting the river as a bathing area without addressing the real issue of why water treatment companies are permitted to discharge sewage into our river – which they should not do whether people swim in the river or not – puts people, and especially children, at risk from swimming in poor quality water. We have heard from multiple sources that there was a mass outbreak of illness following a recent ‘Cam Slow Swim’ event. This is very worrying.” Their concerns are supported by Cllr Jean Glasberg (Green, Newnham) who said: “I understand the concerns about this –people do swim at lots of places in the river, but to designate one as a DBA would require over 100 people to be swimming there every day in the summer. That would raise major issues of environmental capacity and impact on wildlife and biodiversity in this area as it is a nature reserve and protected green space, quite apart from the very valid fears about health and safety. We already know pollution levels in the river are high and there is no evidence at all that a DBA would improve them. We also know much of it is from sewage at Haslingfield, so why is Anglian Water not already working to address the problem and clean up the whole river?”

Ecologist Dr Olwen Williams explained how wildlife would be impacted: “Snob’s brook, which is where Cam Valley Forum proposes swimming lessons, houses water voles – it is illegal to disturb them. Twelve species of fish have been found here, in the River Cam and the Rush stream… Otters have returned in the last few years.” Dr Williams adds: “Attracting more people from across the county to come and swim here would be irresponsible and contrary to the council’s biodiversity emergency policy. I personally think this would be an environmental disaster.”

A spokesperson for the water company said: “We have plans in place for Haslingfield as part of our next investment cycle regardless of designation – but the designation would make them statutory, so we have to do them – whereas without designation, it would be more subject to business plan approval with our regulators. “Poor water quality is not the only driver for investment. There are different bathing water drivers in our environmental programme which is agreed with the Environment Agency at the start of each five-year period. “Not all of them are aimed at improving ‘poor’ water quality. Some are for improving from ‘good’ to ‘excellent’, maintaining ‘excellent’, ensuring no deterioration etc. So if the Cam was designated as ‘excellent’ for example, there are still drivers to allow investment if our assets are deemed to pose a risk to that water quality.

“At Anglian Water, we’re committed to playing our part in making that happen. As part of our Get River Positive programme we’ve pledged to make sure our operations will not be the reason for poor river health. We’re already working with local river and wild swimming groups to support plans for bathing water designation, including those on the River Cam, and are currently undertaking regular water quality testing to support their application.” The motion will be discussed at a meeting of Cambridge City Council on Thursday (July 20).