Join the club, Southern are nearly 50% and they don't even have to treat the water they pump out straight out the chalk and into our taps and the effluent gets dumped straight into the sea so where the moneys going lord only knows
Join the club, Southern are nearly 50% and they don't even have to treat the water they pump out straight out the chalk and into our taps and the effluent gets dumped straight into the sea so where the moneys going lord only knows
It's mad. To appeal to the CMA, competition and markets authority, where no competition exists but where even I can see the logic of the market argument.
"Monopolies should be treated equally and fairly mmmmwah!"
Anyways, this stuck record has broken ad nauseam.
Im not here to defend Themes water and its giant debt burden it can no longer manage, that company has clearly men financially mismanaged to the point of collapse. However when looking at the wider industry we have to occasionally remind ourselves of the when thinking about why bills going up:
By the time the current five-year regulatory period ends, in 2025, water bills will have been flat or falling, in real terms, for 15 years.
It is why water bills in England and Wales are so much lower than in countries like France, Germany, Italy and the United States.
Further back, in the immediate aftermath of the industry's privatisation 34 years ago, the priority was for investment in other areas - chiefly to upgrade crumbling Victorian water mains to reduce leaks and to improve the quality of drinking water in line with EU standards.
Addressing sewage spills was just not a priority for the regulator or the industry - and that was also because they did not happen so much until relatively recently.
Despite investors being asked to pay for upkeep, it is inevitable consumers will have to pay to stop sewage spills. The regulator's focus for the best part of the last two decades has been on keeping water bills down.
news.sky.com
TLDR - bills have been kept lower than comparable neighbours and investment has been focussed on drinking water standards and not sewage. If we want both as we do now, we have to pay for it.
Im not here to defend Themes water and its giant debt burden it can no longer manage, that company has clearly men financially mismanaged to the point of collapse. However when looking at the wider industry we have to occasionally remind ourselves of the when thinking about why bills going up:
By the time the current five-year regulatory period ends, in 2025, water bills will have been flat or falling, in real terms, for 15 years.
It is why water bills in England and Wales are so much lower than in countries like France, Germany, Italy and the United States.
Further back, in the immediate aftermath of the industry's privatisation 34 years ago, the priority was for investment in other areas - chiefly to upgrade crumbling Victorian water mains to reduce leaks and to improve the quality of drinking water in line with EU standards.
Addressing sewage spills was just not a priority for the regulator or the industry - and that was also because they did not happen so much until relatively recently.
Despite investors being asked to pay for upkeep, it is inevitable consumers will have to pay to stop sewage spills. The regulator's focus for the best part of the last two decades has been on keeping water bills down.
news.sky.com
TLDR - bills have been kept lower than comparable neighbours and investment has been focussed on drinking water standards and not sewage. If we want both as we do now, we have to pay for it.
Well you've got PFAS to worry about with drinking water now we've spent decades polluting our groundwater, so that'll need another small fortune of investment that everyone will moan at the water companies about.
Well you've got PFAS to worry about with drinking water now we've spent decades polluting our groundwater, so that'll need another small fortune of investment that everyone will moan at the water companies about.
If something was legal and then decades later turns out to be damaging, you can't retrospectively charge manufacturers for it. These substances have been used in manufacturing of thousands of different consumer products and been part of the economic growth of the country. It's similar issue to diesel - whilst everyone was busy taxing petrol because of carbon emissions it turns out diesel was the more damaging.
That is broadly what is happening but part of the bill still has to pay for the previous investment in drinking water. Billions of investment is not paid for in one hit by customers, it's spread out over the decades life of the asset otherwise it wouldn't be affordable.
A big part of the bill increase this time round is on metering. Most companies are now targeting full metering coverage over the next 10-15 years which is quite expensive.
All this achieves in reality is a middle man billing company skimming off the top to provide an illusion of competition, your water would still come from the same companies it does now and it would still cost them the same to produce it and deal with your waste.
This is all energy 'competition' is really, picking whichever bill processor is skimming the least off the top between what it's costing the actual providers and what you pay.
If anything you increase the risk of **** take pricing, as we saw with energy recently when bill processors were going bust but the generating companies and suppliers were making record profits.
If something was legal and then decades later turns out to be damaging, you can't retrospectively charge manufacturers for it. These substances have been used in manufacturing of thousands of different consumer products and been part of the economic growth of the country. It's similar issue to diesel - whilst everyone was busy taxing petrol because of carbon emissions it turns out diesel was the more damaging.
That is broadly what is happening but part of the bill still has to pay for the previous investment in drinking water. Billions of investment is not paid for in one hit by customers, it's spread out over the decades life of the asset otherwise it wouldn't be affordable.
A big part of the bill increase this time round is on metering. Most companies are now targeting full metering coverage over the next 10-15 years which is quite expensive.
You're confusing legal and damaging. It is down to companies to carry out due diligence to determine whether or not something is harmful. Hence why J and J have been absolutely reemed over talc for example. You can't just make something and put it out there without consequence. The issue comes where some attempt has been made at testing and it hasn't picked up the harmful effects.
All this achieves in reality is a middle man billing company skimming off the top to provide an illusion of competition, your water would still come from the same companies it does now and it would still cost them the same to produce it and deal with your waste.
This is all energy 'competition' is really, picking whichever bill processor is skimming the least off the top between what it's costing the actual providers and what you pay.
If anything you increase the risk of **** take pricing, as we saw with energy recently when bill processors were going bust but the generating companies and suppliers were making record profits.
The only electricity suppliers who actually pushed the industry forward in this space was octopus. But that only worked because the wholesale price of electricity changes on a half hourly basis so there is space in the market for different products (tariffs).
There is no opportunity for ‘innovation’ in water because the underlying cost is effectively static so it’s just a choice of who is skimming the least off the top.
Where there is a monopoly on essential services, they should not be run privately. Water, gas, electric, public transport should all be run publicly in some form.
Privatisation hasn’t benefited the customer anywhere and at best, has shifted the blame. We still have awful services and pay lots on top now to service private equity instead.
Where there is a monopoly on essential services, they should not be run privately. Water, gas, electric, public transport should all be run publicly in some form.
Privatisation hasn’t benefited the customer anywhere and at best, has shifted the blame. We still have awful services and pay lots on top now to service private equity instead.
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