Government pledges to clean up swimming sites

The Government is vowing to clean up New Zealand’s summer swimming spots within five years and is ordering councils to further manage and reduce, E coli levels and implement stricter restrictions.

Yesterday, Environment Minister David Parker released the National Environment Standard on Freshwater Management and the Government’s rewritten National Policy Statement that aimed to improve water quality for rivers, lakes and wetlands.

‘‘Many places we swam in as kids are now not safe to swim in and that is just not good enough. We have to quickly stop it getting worse and then we have to reverse the past damage.’’

The raft of proposals set out in the Government’s plan to stop the degradation of waterways, included new requirements to improve freshwater by setting higher standards for swimmability in summer, with a greater effort put into reducing contamination as well as interim controls on land intensification and a higher bar on ecosystem health.

The Government’s action plan for healthy waterways states that E coli in water was an indicator of faecal contamination and swimmers risked infection or illness from pathogens.

Regional councils had already set targets for swimmable rivers and lakes, but there was confusion about what ‘swimmable’ meant and whether the current threshold was stringent enough.

There was agreement that the science of current threshold needed to reviewed but in the interim, the proposal set clear standards for swimming in summer, at freshwater places where people popularly swim, or would if water quality was better.

Currently, councils monitor about 290 swimming spots, known as ‘primary contact sites’. They would now also prepare action plans that set out what will be done to manage, and where necessary reduce, E coli levels at those sites.

An overwhelming number of Kiwis wanted the Government to act so they could swim in their local rivers and put their head under water without the risk of getting crook, Parker said.

‘‘My promise is that we will turn the tide within five years and that we will clean it up over a generation.’’

However, he could not specify how long he defined as a generation. When asked how he defined swimmability, he said it related to to microbes in the water, particularly high levels of E coli.

A lot of rivers were still swimmable but the number where E coli levels were too high, had grown in recent decades, he said.

‘‘So we are proposing to halt that decline within five years and want to see material improvements.’’

This would be done through upgrading E coli prevention measures, he said. The existing E coli standards would continue to apply to all other water bodies, along with the existing requirement for councils to work towards reducing E. coli levels everywhere to contribute to achieving national swimmability targets set in 2017.

‘‘The effect of the change would be that councils would increase their efforts to improve water quality where people want to swim. This may include placing stricter requirements on upstream discharges of wastewater, or on stock access close to popular and monitored swim spots,’’ the document states.