An award-winning, picturesque village has pulled out of a contest after raw sewage was dumped into the river for months, causing a vile smell and the closure of a children’s playground.
Chalfont St Giles in Buckinghamshire, nestled on the edge of the Chiltern Hills, has won the county’s ‘Best Kept Village’ contest six times since 2002.
But last week it was forced to withdraw its application for this year’s contest after Thames Water admitted it has been releasing sewage into the River Misbourne since January.
Villagers have been complaining for months about a foul smell and after learning of the discharges, closed a children’s playground, river walk and duck pond.
Villagers of Chalfont St Giles pose on a green with a pond visible in the background. The village had to pull out of the Best Kept Village contest this year
A children’s playpark was also closed after Thames Water released diluted sewage into the river
Chalfont St Giles was the winner of the ‘Best Kept Village’ award in 2023 and was hoping to scoop a further award in which previous winners can compete against each other.
Robert Gill, from the parish council, said: ‘The cup means where if you win multiple years on the trot, you’re in the running for getting the best village for multiple years.
‘This has removed any chance of getting that.
‘Our village show has had to be cancelled. It is quite a major issue for us as we’ve lost much of our summer festivities to this.
‘The way the best-kept village is marked, they look at playgrounds, open areas, places where people tend to congregate and enjoy the village.
‘We’ve told people you shouldn’t be near those areas at the moment, especially the children’s play area. It would be a waste of time for people coming to see us.’
The extent of the flooding from the river which was full of diluted sewage in Chalfont St Giles in February 2024
Polluted waterway in Chalfont St Giles. Locals complained of a vile odour for several months
Mr Gill, who has lived in the village for 20 years, said he was ‘absolutely appalled’ by the sewage running through Chalfont St Giles and that the village had been ‘sacrificed’.
He added: ‘We’re all gutted. We’re parishioners ourselves and it took a lot of time for us to debate this.
‘It is important to villagers to that we enter these competitions but we were left with no choice.
‘Chalfont St Giles is a quintessential and beautiful village. It is a lovely place to live with our river running through.
‘It has been ruined by the actions of Thames Water. They sacrificed us to deal with other problems.
‘It is bad enough that this has happened and we don’t want it to happen again.’
Mr Gill said villages became aware of sewage smells in June of last year and the parish council were initially told it could be the drains.
However, in January of this year, they found that the Amersham Road Balancing Tank was overflowing and pumping diluted sewage into the River Misbourne.
The river flows through the village and Mr Gill said a specialist team sent out by Thames Water found that levels of contamination were high.
Mr Gill continued: ‘The parish council had a letter in February from the Environmental Agency informing them there had been an incident and the sewers has flooded.
Thames Water discharged into the River Misbourne, a precious chalk stream, at the Amersham Balancing Tanks
Another picture of polluted water in the picturesque village in Buckinghamshire. Several areas including a river walk were closed as a result
‘From our understanding, Thames Water diverted sewage from the sewers and into our river.
‘The way it was worded, it sounded like a single incident but this has been going on for months.
‘They’ve been using the river to keep the pressure down.’
Mr Gill said the letter said that Thames Water had taken action to reduce the amount of sewage entering the sewer network which resulted in sewage flowing into the river since January 3.
The parish council are investigating how the diluted sewage was left pumping into their river for so long and what they can do to stop it from happening again, Mr Gill said.
He added: ‘We’ve never had sewage before. Sometimes it floods as we’re on a flood plain, but now we’ve got sewage seeping into the fields from the flooding.
‘It has been an awful period of time for us and we’re seeking to find out why it happened and what changes will be made going forward.’
A Thames Water spokesperson said: ‘Our region has experienced the eighth wettest winter on record, resulting in exceptionally high groundwater and river levels. This groundwater and river floodwater then entered our sewers and filled the Amersham storm tanks, meaning they are full and are discharging diluted wastewater into the river Misbourne, for which we are sorry.
Chalfont St Giles in Buckinghamshire, (pictured), has won the county’s ‘Best Kept Village’ contest six times since 2002
High water levels at the ford in Mill Lane, Chalfont St Giles on February 16, 2024
‘We’ve put transparency at the heart of what we do, and we were the first water company to publish a real time data map. Our monitor at our Amersham Storm Tanks site is now publishing this data for the public to see and while all discharges are unacceptable, the sewage system was historically designed to work in this way, to prevent sewage backing up into people’s homes.
‘We know how much rivers are loved and enjoyed by everyone, and we are committed to seeing our waterways thrive. Our engineers are using filter units at the storm tanks and are working hard to minimise the impact to the river.
‘We have published plans to upgrade 250 of our sites across the region, as we strive to increase treatment capacity and reduce the number of necessary discharges. However, more investment is needed across the entire sector, as infrastructure ages and demand on it increases. That’s why we’ve asked for increased investment in the next regulatory cycle between 2025-2030.’
Chalfont St Giles is mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 was home to poet John Milton when he completed Paradise Lost.
It was also used a film set for the 1971 film Dads’ Army where it represented Walmington-on-Sea.
A host of celebrities have previously lived in the village including Ozzy Osbourne and Noel Gallagher.
The Best Kept Village contest is organised by the Campaign for Rural England.