Warning issued after untreated sewage released into Scarborough's North Bay 'due to heavy rainfall'

The alert, from the Safer Seas and Rivers Service, run by the charity Surfers Against Sewage is based on data provided by Yorkshire Water. It said that storm sewage has been discharged from a sewer overflow in the North Bay within the last past 48 hours.

There are three sewer overflows that discharge into the sea at various distances from the bathing water and a number more discharging into Scalby Beck at the northern end of the beach.

A Yorkshire Water spokesperson said: “Our storm overflows at Scalby Mills and Whitby both operated recently after a period of heavy rain in the local area which led to high flows within the sewer network.

“As a result, our overflows operated to prevent localised flooding in homes, gardens and the local environment. We continue to work hard to reduce discharges from storm overflows across the region.”

Yorkshire Water told The Scarborough News that it is investing £790m to improve rivers and bathing waters across the county, including £137m by 2025 to improve the monitoring of storm overflows.

Scarborough’s South Bay narrowly escaped being downgraded and removed from the safe bathing waters list last year after inspections were halted during the coronavirus pandemic.

South Bay received four ‘Poor’ ratings between 2016 and 2019, however, regulations state that any bathing areas that receive five consecutive years of ‘Poor’ ratings should be removed from the official safe bathing waters list.

No rating was awarded in 2020, due to the pandemic, and so the monitoring restarted in 2021 when it was classified as ‘Sufficient’.

In contrast, North Bay received ‘Excellent’ status in 2019 and 2021.

Yorkshire Water data reveals that untreated sewage was also released into the sea at beaches in Whitby, Robin Hood’s Bay and Sandsend. Sewage was previously released in North Bay on August 22.

In August, the Government said it is taking action to prevent water companies from discharging untreated sewage from sewer overflows, but there is mounting public anger over the environmental impact.

Water Minister Steve Double said: “We are the first Government to take action to tackle sewage overflows. We have been clear that water companies’ reliance on overflows is unacceptable and they must significantly reduce how much sewage they discharge as a priority.”

In parliament this week, Green Party MP Caroline Lucas has urged the Government to return the “failing” water industry to public ownership.

In October last year, a proposal from the House of Lords to the Environment Bill would have placed legal duties on water companies to reduce sewage discharges, but this was rejected by Government – including votes from Scarborough and Whitby MP Sir Robert Goodwill and Thirsk and Malton MP Kevin Hollinrake, which includes Filey.