Missed opportunity to stop customers footing bill for water company failures

In this week’s debate on the Water (Special Measures) Bill Victoria Collins, MP for Harpenden & Berkhamsted, backed a Liberal Democrat amendment to protect customers from footing the bill for water company bailouts.

This continues her long-fought campaign to hold water companies to account to create a better deal for customers, who are seeing sky-rocketing water bills whilst companies continue to dump sewage into local waterways.

However as Labour and Conservative MPs failed to back the amendment, this opportunity to protect bill-payers was unsuccessful.

This debate on the Bill came soon after reports (on 24 January 2025) that Thames Water have consistently dumped sewage into the River Ver (at the Markyate storm overflow) since 12 December last year. This equates to over 1000 hours of polluting.

Alongside this, on average a third of bills paid to water companies are spent on debt, and bills for Thames Water customers are set to rise by £151 over the next year - an increase of 31%.

That’s why Victoria and her Liberal Democrat colleagues are continuing to campaign for a better deal for customers, protecting them from covering the costs of water companies’ financial mismanagement and soaring bills, whilst companies continue to pollute precious local waterways and grant extortionate bonuses to their executives.

During the debate, Victoria highlighted that whilst Thames Water’s chief executive pocketed £195,000 in bonuses, her constituents were seeing 100 days of sewage dumping into the River Ver. She highlighted that allowing such bonuses fails to incentivise water companies to stop this polluting practice.

And as the Bill progresses, Victoria and her Liberal Democrat colleagues will keep pushing for greater protections for customers, and greater accountability for water companies - like introducing a stronger new regulator to finally end sewage dumping once and for all, and banning bonuses for executives whilst it continues.

This furthers the calls she has already made in Parliament, in writing to Thames Water, and the discussions she has had on this issue locally from meeting with groups like the Ver Valley Society.

Speaking in the debate, Victoria said:

“While the chief executive officer of Thames Water was getting £195,000 in bonuses, we in Harpenden and Berkhamsted saw over 100 days of non-stop sewage in our river, which is a chalk stream. The same is now happening again, one year later, with 1,000 hours of non-stop sewage. Does the hon. Member agree that the system clearly does not work, and that such bonuses do not provide the right incentives?”