Crap Towns / Warwickshire / Southam
Southam
7/100Crap Score
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 7. Higher scores are crapper.
Have your say
Crap Town of the Year 2026/27
See the raceThe public vote. It's separate from the Crap Score, and it closes on 31 December 2027.
Letters from the locals
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agree it's crap have defended it
HS2 lorries, and nothing to do.
Old coaching stop, old cement works, video game studios and HS2 lorries through the middle.
Southam reckons it saw the opening fight of the English Civil War. It hasn't seen much since. There's nothing to do and the town centre gives you no reason to stop, unless you count the HS2 lorries, which don't stop either. The game studios round here invent whole worlds. None of them look like Southam.
What Southam does do is sewage. The overflows within a kilometre of town spilled for 1,873 hours per 10,000 people a year, nearly seven times the typical town. For a place where nothing happens, a hell of a lot comes out of the pipes. On a Wednesday the last bus is at 8.07pm, so you're stuck in with it.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Southam's 93 for sewage spills means it's crapper than 93% of towns.
- Sewage spills93/1001,873 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Rain36/100122 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Broadband32/1001.3% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 14.7% across the Stratford-on-Avon council area
- Anti-social behaviour32/10012.3 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Air pollution31/1005.7 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 6.7 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Food hygiene26/1000.0% rated 0 to 2, of the 38 food businesses with a rating
- Serious road collisions14/1001.2 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Deliberate fires13/1002.5 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Criminal damage and arson8/1003.9 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Fly-tipping4/1003.4 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Stratford-on-Avon council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bedworth | 70 |
| 2 | Warwick | 64 |
| 3 | Nuneaton | 62 |
| 4 | Rugby | 54 |
| 5 | Royal Leamington Spa | 46 |
| In danger of becoming nice from here down.6 | Stratford-upon-Avon | 37 |
| 7 | Kenilworth | 26 |
| – | Southam | 7 |
Below the dashed line: in danger of becoming nice.
Southam by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 45.0 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Better: 41% lower than the typical town's 76.2
- 37 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 45.6 per 10,000 people, 13.4x the typical town's 3.4
What's left on the high street
- 5 pubs, 3 hairdressers, 2 charity shops, 1 bookmaker, 1 bank on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 bank branch closure announced since 2022 Worse: 12.3 per 100,000 people, 3.6x the typical town's 3.4
- 2 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 2.5 per 10,000 people, 1.6x the typical town's 1.6
- 1 public swimming pool open Better: 1.2 per 10,000 people, 1.7x the typical English town's 0.7
- 2 places on England's Heritage at Risk register
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 8.07pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.1% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 80% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 7.7% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 50% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,535 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) About the same: About the same as the typical town's 1,532
Stratford-on-Avon council
- £2,484 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £92 more than the English average
- 13% of Warwickshire County Council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 19% lower than England's 16%
- None ombudsman complaints upheld against the council in 2025-26
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Southam against your mate's town, and a match ticket to rub it in.
- ?Fly-tippingper 1,000, council area?
- ?Anti-social behaviourper 1,000 people?
- ?Serious road crashesper 10,000 people?
- ?Sewage spillshours per 10,000 people?
- ?Food hygienerated poor?
- ?Criminal damageper 1,000 people?
- ?Dirty airµg/m³?
- ?No gigabitof premises can't get it?
- ?Deliberate firesper 10,000 people?
- ?Raindays a year?
Ten ingredients. One verdict. Who's crapper? The higher Crap Score takes it.