A new report out this morning has found systemic water company failure and underperformance with serious pollution incidents up 60% in 2024 from the previous year
The report shows consistently poor performance from all nine water and sewerage companies in the region,
81% of these serious incidents were the responsibility of just three water companies – Thames Water (33 incidents), Southern Water (15 incidents) and Yorkshire Water (13 incidents).
The Environmental Agency is particularly concerned about the increasing trend in pollution spills from pipes carrying wastewater uphill – these accounted for 20% of the serious incidents in 2024 and impacted some protected waters for wildlife and swimming.
Reasons behind the 2024 results include persistent underinvestment in new infrastructure, poor asset maintenance, and reduced resilience due to the impacts of climate change.
Alan Lovell, Chair of the Environment Agency said:
This report demonstrates continued systemic failure by some companies to meet their environmental targets.
The water industry must act urgently to prevent pollution from occurring and to respond rapidly when it does.
We have made significant changes to tighten our regulation of the water industry and ensure companies are held to account. With a dedicated larger workforce and increased funding, our officers are uncovering and acting on failures to comply with environmental law.
