Top-grade bathing waters grow in number in England as do sub-standard ones

The percentage of bathing waters in England classified as excellent in 2018 increased to 67.1% from 65.6% in the previous year according to the latest government statistics.

Waters marked as poor – below the minimum standard – increased year-on-year from 1.7% to 2.1%. Waters classified as good fell from 26.4% of the total to 25.25 while those designated sufficient fell from 6.3% to 5.5%.

The number of waters classified was increased by seven in 2018 from the previous two years to 420.

This is the fourth year of implementing the classification system so they are not directly comparable to those results produced prior to 2015.