By James Rougvie

THE BLUE Flag of excellence which was unceremoniously uprooted from Broughty Ferry beach will not return until next year even if the water quality improves drastically in the next few weeks or months.

Dundee City Council and locals who prided themselves on having helped to restore the beach to its former glory were dismayed when water samples indicated standards below that required for the retention of Blue Flag status.

The Keep Scotland Beautiful organisation, responsible for the Blue Flag standard, also removed the award from the East Sands at Andrews following tests carried out by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA).

These showed in both instances that water quality fell below the mark of excellence required.

According to local councillor Ken Guild, SEPA told him that run off from farmers’ fields, specifically nitrates and phosphates, had been implicated in the water sampling.

That was in addition to a marked lack of sunshine, which normally helps to dissipate toxins, and the high rainfall which rendered water treatment plants on both sides of the Tay less effective.

A spokeswoman for the agriculture arm of SEPA, however, yesterday professed bewilderment that their tests had included sampling for fertiliser-based pollutants.

“Our sampling normally does not involve nitrates or phosphates, but it is true that the low sunshine and high rainfall did affect the water quality and that was why the beach lost its Blue Flag status.”

The spokeswoman was at pains to point out that the beach was on track to maintain the lesser status of “good” and that it still retained its award for good management and the cleanliness of the beach.

But there will be no prospect of the Blue Flag being planted on the beach again before high summer next year, since SEPA only sample the waters between June and September.

“Even if the water improves, it does not mean that the status will revert to that of excellent. That will depend on sampling next year.”

SEPA yesterday said that Broughty Ferry had only marginally missed out on excellent status.

The body’s water quality expert, Calum McPhail, said while missing out on excellent status had resulted in the loss of the flag it had always been recognised that water results could be heavily influenced by the weather, and in fact both Broughty Ferry and St Andrews East Sands had both held up extremely well despite the wet weather.

He added that SEPA’s pollution reduction plan clearly stated that for Broughty Ferry agriculture was not considered to have a significant impact on the bathing water, nor were nitrates and phosphates part of the Euro standards for bathing water quality.

Mr McPhail stressed that fertiliser overload—which could result from farmland run-off—was not the cause of the decrease in water quality.