Dave Thomas: Council's health teams play their part after water illness outbreak

Cryptosporidium Outbreak – the council’s involvement 

I wanted to start this week’s column talking about the Cryptosporidium outbreak that Brixham and the surrounding areas have been dealing with since last week. At the time of writing there are still 2,500 properties that are having to be careful with their drinking water and are currently under a ‘boil water’ notice from South West Water.

There has been a lot of information about the outbreak sent out by South West Water and ourselves and you would have no doubt seen the coverage in the local and national media. 

When something like this happens, a wide range of teams across the council start working through their emergency plans.  

Our Director of Public Health has done a great job as our spokesperson, fronting many media interviews, providing the public health response and messages. Our Public Health team, along with Officers from our Environmental Health, Engagement and Communications, Education, Early Years, Harbours, Emergency planning and Economic Development teams have also been working hard with South West Water, the UK Health Security Agency and the Environment Agency. Ensuring our residents and businesses have been provided with the most up to date information and supporting them with any questions they may have. 

I also want to say a big thank you to our community and voluntary sector, who once again, and like in the Covid pandemic, sprang into action. They have been supporting by making sure vulnerable people have been added to the priority list to ensure they will receive daily bottles of water. They have also been ensuring those who can’t get out to get bottled water collection points are receiving it. Once again, their hard work and our working in partnership has provided a great response to what was and still is a horrible situation. 

Unfortunately our hospitality trade has been hit hard by this, especially those businesses in Brixham. We now will be all working together to tell everyone that the English Riviera is a safe place to come and visit. So if you are talking to friends and family who have been thinking about changing plans to visit, please encourage them to still visit. The Bay is very much open and welcoming visitors. 

Keeping the mood positive, some news that was announced last week may have passed you by while rightly so, the outbreak was taking place.  

Government confirmed to us at the end of last week that we have been successful in being named as the latest place to benefit from a major tailored regeneration programme called Levelling Up Partnership 

Along with the representatives from our Torbay Place Leadership Board, we have worked together to submit and develop a programme with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities that will see a further £20.25 million come into the Bay. 

This takes the amount of funding we have secured to just over £105million, alongside the Regeneration Partnership announced last year.  

Hearing that we have secured this Levelling Up Partnership is fantastic news. This will really give us the opportunity to drive forward a range of projects that will have an impact on all three of our towns. 

Torbay is really at the beginning of a once in a generation transformation journey. Our focus is on, and will continually be on, making the most of our marine and natural environment alongside the heritage that has shaped the English Riviera.  

Telling our story and being part of the Torbay Place Leadership Board means we are collectively raising awareness of our aspirations for our place.  

This week I have been away at a large investor and developer conference and exhibition called UKREiiF. It was through our connection with this event that conversations were started with our now Regeneration Partner. This once again was an opportunity for us to really put Torbay on the map with those people who can come and help us achieve our regeneration aspirations. I’ll let you know more about the conversations we had there next week. 

Cllr David Thomas 

Leader, Torbay Council