A comedian has criticised Scottish Water after filming ‘water containing raw sewage’ discharging into a Fife beach.
Never Mind the Buzzcocks star Phill Jupitus shared a clip of water overflowing and running into the North Sea at West Shore in Pittenweem.
The drains are used as relief points in the network during heavy rainfall – preventing sewage backing up into people’s homes.
He claims to have witnessed the drains overflowing several times since he moved to the Fife village six years ago – despite being told by Scottish Water it’s the type of event that occurs once every three decades.
Sharing the video on Instagram, he wrote: “This pumping station on West Shore Pittenweem was put in to cope with what Scottish Water described as a ‘Once every thirty years rainfall event’.
“This cover the overflow is gushing out of was actually forced off by the pressure on June 19th this year, and has been a few times over the six years I’ve lived here, and the shore path was covered in shreds of toilet paper.
“Because yes, this ‘overflow’ also contains raw sewage.
“There are seven of these outflow pipes along this stretch of coast which when it rains, discharge the rain overspill with untreated sewage, which is then sieved before flowing into the sea.”.
Scottish Water claims the majority of the water comes from run-offs from roads and from household appliances.
Overflows ‘essential’ part of water waste
A spokesperson said: “Scottish Water are planning a multimillion pound upgrade of the sewer network in Pittenweem to reduce the risk of internal sewer flooding to a number of properties in the village.
“This work involves upgrading two unpumped combined sewer overflows in the village as well as installing new outfalls.
“12 of the 15 bathing waters in Fife are classified as ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ including Billow Ness beach in nearby Anstruther.
“Combined sewer overflows are an essential and regulated part of the waste water network.
“They act as relief points during periods of heavy rain to help prevent flooding in the street and in properties.
“Less than 1% of what is spilled under licence during heavy rainfall is actually sewage from toilets.
“The vast majority is run-off from roads and roofs as well as grey water from household appliances etc.
“We take the issue of sewer overflows seriously and published our improving urban water’s routemap last year which commits us to investing up to £500million in the network up to 2027.”
