Labour’s shadow environment secretary, Steve Reed MP, accompanied by Helena Dollimore, Labour's parliamentary candidate for Rye and Hastings and Cllr Simon McGurk visited Rye last week meeting business owners and residents who have recently been impacted by severe flooding and water outages.
He spoke about Labour’s plan to ban the payment of bonuses to water bosses for poor performance. This comes as consumers in Rye are faced with an average £262 hike a year in their water bill.
He condemned Conservative negligence and the drastic price hike, and called on the water industry to be put under special measures.
According to Steve Reed, boosting the regulatory powers of Ofwat would mean water bosses who fail to meet high environmental standards on sewage pollution will be met with significant sanctions to ensure they cannot profit from damaging the environment.
According to company reports from 2021-22, the bonus pool for executives stood at an average of more than £600,000 at each company. In total, 22 water bosses paid themselves £24.8m, including £14.7m in bonuses, benefits and incentives, in 2021-22.
Labour’s wider plan to put the water industry under special measures includes:
- Ensuring that water bosses will face personal criminal liability for extreme and persistent lawbreaking.
- Introducing severe, automatic fines for illegal discharges.
- Forcing all companies to monitor every single water outlet.
Steve Reed said:
“The water industry is broken after 13 years of Tory government – with stinking, toxic sewage lapping up on our rivers, lakes, and seas.
“It is shocking that during a cost-of-living crisis, consumers in Rye are now being forced to pay £262 more a year, whilst CEOs are pocketing millions in bonuses.
“This Conservative government is too weak to tackle this scandal. They cut back enforcement and monitoring against water companies releasing this filth, and are now failing to hold bosses to account when they are blatantly breaking the law."
