A WATER company has been fined thousands of pounds after discharging poor quality sewage into the sea in Clacton.

Anglian Water was taken to court by the Environment Agency for breaching its permit conditions to discharge up to 27,419 cubic metres of secondary-treated sewage into the water each day.

Too much of the discharge had not been properly treated before it was pumped into the sea from Clacton Sewage Treatment Works, in Holland Haven, on two occasions last year.

Anglian Water admitted the charges at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday.

The company was fined a total of £28,000, as well as being ordered to pay costs of £3,375 and a victim surcharge of £120.

Environment Agency senior officer Jamie Fairfull said: “There has been a long history of permit breaches at the site and the incidents in 2012 involved significant breaches of a permit condition.”