A MAYOR has explained why a popular Tendring beach will never be commercialised, saying how its independence is its "beauty".
Frinton beach has officially been named as the country's cleanest beach after Green Olive Firewood identified assessed nearly 80,000 reviews of beaches.
The study looked at more than 50 of the UK’s biggest beaches before concluding Frinton beach had the most mentions of words associated with cleanliness.
Unlike other beaches in the area, Frinton's seafront has no shops or stalls on the beach, something which some reviews in the study mentioned as being a bit of an issue.
Paul Clifton, the Mayor of Frinton and Walton, however, prefers it that way, and has vowed to keep commercialisation out of the town.
He said: “Because there are no food trolleys and ice cream vans it saves families going through the hassle of having to afford snacks, ice creams and drinks.
“People go there because there’s nothing to spend money on. That is the beauty of it and we try really hard to keep it that way.
“A lot of people say if we charged for parking we could make loads of money but the whole ethos is that you can go to the beach for next to nothing.
“People are struggling with costs and everyone should get to enjoy the beach for no cost - if you want a cheaper day out you can go to Frinton.
“We don’t want to commercialise Frinton and that’s the beauty of it - there are lots of small businesses in Frinton that we would rather people support.
“Ice cream vans take the money away from the businesses in Frinton which we are strongly against."
Nonetheless, Mr Clifton is thrilled to hear Frinton beach has been named the country's cleanest.
He said: “It’s a beautiful beach, there’s no stones and very little litter.
“The water is generally really good and it's quite shallow. It’s an absolutely beautiful beach and our local people are really proud of it.
“I recently judged a sandcastle making competition and one of the teams walked for a mile to try and find stones and barely found any.
“They picked up any litter they saw and only came back with a small handful, which shows how clean the beach is.
“We look after the beaches in this area the best as we can. It thoroughly deserves the rating and we're happy for it to be recognised.”
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