Water firms to get ‘MOT checks’ in regulatory overhaul Regulation Water companies are set to receive “MOT checks” on the quality of their infrastructure in a fresh regulatory overhaul aimed at preventing crumbling pipes, mishandled sewage and unreliable services. Utilities businesses will receive “health checks” to assess the quality of pumps and pipes by a new water regulator set to be introduced under the government’s [...]
Thames Water lenders offer £17bn plan, push Ofwat for ‘regulatory reset’ Transport and infrastructure A group of Thames Water’s major creditors have put forward a sweeping, multibillion-pound rescue deal, while calling for forgiveness of historic fines from Ofwat. Major investment firms, including Aberdeen and Elliott Management, are among the investors, who have said they have “the funding and experience required to deliver a transformation of the company’s performance which is intended [...]
Thames Water: Water boss bonus ban comes into force Transport and infrastructure Six water companies including crisis-hit Thames Water will be banned from paying bonuses to senior bosses. New measures in the Water (Special Measures) Act come into force on Friday, prohibiting utility firms that oversee “poor environmental and customer outcomes” from offering bonuses to senior bosses. The companies impacted are Thames Water, Yorkshire Water, Anglian Water, [...]
Record 81 criminal investigations opened into water firms May 20, 2025 Over 80 criminal investigations into water firms have been launched since the general election, which if proven could leave bosses facing five years in jail and firms on the hook for hundreds of millions of pounds, the environment watchdog has said. The Environment Agency has used new powers handed to it by the government to [...]
MPs demand changes to inheritance tax raid on farms May 16, 2025 Plans to levy inheritance tax on farmland threaten the future of British agriculture and should be paused while its ill effects are properly examined, an influential committee of MPs has said. In a damning report on the state of British farming, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee argued there was a “considerable risk” [...]
UK’s ageing water network would take 700 years to replace at current rate April 25, 2025 Britain’s ageing water network would take 700 years to replace if work continues at the rate seen since privatisation, according to Whitehall’s spending watchdog. The National Audit Office (NAO) on Friday released an extensive investigation into the performance of the the three water regulators, Ofwat, the Drinking Water Inspectorate and the Environment Agency, and Defra. [...]
A game of chlorinated chicken: What is the price of a US-UK trade deal? April 17, 2025 An economic deal between the UK and the US could be just weeks away. The Trump administration has made sweeping promises of a “90 deals in 90 days” package of bespoke arrangements. While deals with India, Japan and South Korea are expected to be done first, the UK is understood to be not far behind [...]
Water firms to be forced to increase customer compensation for failures December 17, 2024 The changes come after a series of outages earlier in May left tens of thousands of homes in Brixham without clean drinking water.
Hedge fund managers could buy land, MPs told, as Tories fail to scrap ‘farm tax’ December 4, 2024 Hedge fund managers could buy up farmland if UK farmers sell up to avoid the inheritance levy, MPs were told, as the Tories brought a vote on the so-called ‘family farms tax’. Conservative MPs used an opposition day debate on Wednesday to bring a Commons vote on Labour’s Budget measure which would see farmers pay [...]
South West Water customers given £450m in subsidies while firm dished out £1.5bn in dividends November 25, 2024 South West Water customers were given nearly half a billion pounds in government subsidies to keep their bills down, despite the water firm shelling out three times that amount in dividends to shareholders over the same period. The Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has been giving people in South West Water’s catchment [...]