Demanding Better from Thames Water Following Excessive Spills

While thousands of constituents were watching the Dirty Business docudrama revealing the scale of Thames Water’s sewage scandal, untreated sewage was flowing into the Winterborne stream for more than 800 hours. 

Thames Water claims that this is an unavoidable consequence of heavy rain. However, during this period, they replied to my letter requesting an update on the status of their storm infrastructure reassuring me that their sewage treatment works (STW) were “under pressure but coping”.

The spills didn’t end there, either. As I write this article, the latest discharge in the Winterborne stream has been going on for over 289 hours. That’s twelve days - of which many have been dry and sunny. At one point last week, all eight STW serving the Newbury constituency were discharging simultaneously. 

I also received recent footage from residents in Lambourn showing effluent flooding into a public street. This is deeply distressing and raises serious concerns about the integrity and maintenance of the network, not to mention public health, local waterways, and the wider environment.

And this is not just a local problem. New national data from the Environment Agency reveals that water companies discharged sewage 291,492 times last year, lasting a total of 1,873,751 hours, nearly two million hours of pollution in our waterways. Thames Water was the worst offender for duration, with spills lasting an average of 11.7 hours each.

These figures show a system that is clearly failing. Despite repeated promises from the Government to strengthen regulation, including plans to replace Ofwat with a more powerful body, we are yet to see the meaningful reform that is urgently needed.

Following these events, I have written to the CEO of Thames Water requesting an urgent and detailed explanation of the causes of these spills, as well as the measures they are taking to prevent further unlawful discharges.

It is simply unacceptable that water companies are repeatedly polluting our precious rivers and streams while evading punishment, increasing customer bills, and resisting calls to end illegal dry-weather spills.

I will continue holding the company to account and update you as I hear more.