England's best ever bathing-water quality results will be announced today, with a record 99.5% of all bathing waters meeting EU standards, compared with 98.8% in 2005.

Only two of England's 413 monitored waters on the coast and inland failed to reach the minimum mandatory standard. They are at Staithes in North Yorkshire and Hampstead Heath (ladies' pond) in London.

Environment minister Ian Pearson said: "This year's results represent the highest compliance with European bathing water standards since monitoring began. We should be very proud of the consistently high standard of water quality being achieved each year at our bathing waters.

"The money that has been invested by water companies and others since the 1990s to improve water quality is now showing real results, bringing benefits to the environment, public health and tourism."

The figures also showed that 75.1% of all English bathing waters also reached much tighter "guideline" water-quality standards, higher than last year's figure of 73.7%.

Mr Pearson added: "Work is continuing to improve water quality still further, by upgrading sewerage infrastructure and tackling diffuse water pollution from farming and urban sources. This still affects the quality of bathing water at some of our beaches, and we will be working closely with farmers and others to reduce this type of pollution."