In October 1999 the European Commission decided to send a Reasoned Opinion to the United Kingdom for non-respect of the European Union's quality of Bathing Waters Directive. The Commission is dissatisfied that 15 years after the deadline for compliance expired, the United Kingdom has still not introduced sufficient measures to curb pollution in order to meet the criteria set out in the Directive. The Commission's action stems from the investigation of a complaint that the United Kingdom has been consistently failing to meet the Directive's standards. An analysis of the available data by the Commission showed the complaint to be well-founded. By way of illustration, for the 1996 bathing season, the UK's rate of compliance with mandatory values under the Directive was 89.4 % and with guide values 46%. The figures for 1997 were 88.3% for mandatory values and 43.3% for guide values. The 1998 figures were 88.7% and 44.2% respectively.