The Financial Times: Watchdog fines just four companies despite 300,000 sewage spills
“Campaigners say Environment Agency lacks resources to hold offenders to account.”
The Financial Times has obtained official data revealing that only four water companies faced prosecution by the environment watchdog for breaching overflow permits between 2018 and 2022, despite the occurrence of hundreds of thousands of sewage spills during that period. The Environment Agency fined Southern Water, Severn Trent, Anglian Water, and Yorkshire Water a total of just over £94 million in seven cases. Notably, a single fine imposed on Southern Water accounted for £90 million of that total. The breaches primarily involved violations of "storm overflow" permits, which permit the release of wastewater into rivers or the sea under specific circumstances to prevent overwhelming the sewage system.
This lack of prosecutions has sparked public outrage over the high levels of sewage polluting the UK's waterways and seas, leading to intense criticism of water companies and regulators. Campaign groups argue that the Environment Agency is severely under-resourced and incapable of holding companies accountable for environmental offenses. River Action UK, a charity and campaigning group, has highlighted how years of austerity measures have resulted in a decline in environmental protection due to defunding. The group emphasizes the crucial role regulators play in ensuring the public and businesses rely on their effective enforcement of environmental regulations.
According to Financial Times research, water companies paid out £1.4 billion in dividends last year. In 2022 alone, ten water and sewerage companies operating in England discharged sewage into rivers and the sea on 301,091 occasions. While many of these spills were legally permitted, government data indicates that there were 554 breaches of storm overflow permits in 2022 and over 1,600 since 2020. Unfortunately, the data does not disclose the penalties imposed for these breaches. The information also reveals at least 15 instances in 2022 when Southern Water and Wessex Water discharged sewage into the environment without a storm overflow permit.
The Environment Agency acknowledged that polluting rivers is unacceptable and claimed to be holding the water industry accountable on an unprecedented scale. Breaching a storm overflow permit can result in various penalties, including written warnings, prosecutions, and "enforcement undertakings" where the offending company offers to address the problem and make a charitable donation. However, between June and December 2022, the Environment Agency only accepted one enforcement undertaking from a water company. Welsh Water, which had breached its sewage treatment works permits, agreed to pay £50,000 to the Wye and Usk Foundation, an ecology charity.
Apart from storm overflow rules, companies can also face prosecution for sewage spills under the "water discharge activities" regulations. According to government data, three water companies were prosecuted by the Environment Agency between 2018 and 2022 for breaching water discharge permits through sewage spills. Ofwat, the water industry regulator, has fined only one privatized utility for violating sewage spill prevention regulations in England since the rules were implemented nearly 30 years ago. Currently, the regulator is investigating six water companies over concerns of potential sewage regulation breaches, while the Environment Agency is examining potentially illegal discharges at over 2,000 sewage works.
Southern Water stated that it is actively monitoring and self-reporting to the Environment Agency, while pending applications for sites without permits have been submitted. Yorkshire Water acknowledged that despite operating over 2,200 overflows in the region, sometimes incidents occur where they are unable to meet permit standards, and they strive to minimize the environmental impact. Anglian Water and Severn Trent declined to provide comments on the matter.
