Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Munira Wilson and Robbie Moore(1 month, 2 weeks ago)
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Robbie Moore
When the Leader of the Opposition says that he would want Wales to be his blueprint if Labour gets into power in England, I fear for this country. We have seen far worse water pollution under Welsh Labour, as has already been said. We will continue with our plan for water, which is about more investment, stronger regulation and much tougher enforcement against those who pollute.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Robbie Moore)
DEFRA, supported by the Environment Agency, is currently seeking clarification from Thames Water on its revised draft water resources management plan to help inform the next steps for the Teddington project. The proposals are still at an early stage. Thames Water will continue to carry out further consultation over the next couple of years to help it design and carry out further environmental assessments of the scheme.
Munira Wilson
The water resources management plan for the south-east, which contains the highly controversial Teddington direct river abstraction proposal opposed by tens of thousands of local residents and river users across south-west London, has been sitting on the Environment Secretary’s desk since August. We have been calling for the Teddington proposal to be taken out of the plan, and we were told that a decision would be made by Christmas, then by February 2024, and now we are told it will be made in due course. In the meantime, as the Minister suggests, Thames Water is wasting huge amounts of billpayers’ money on the proposals, so will he confirm when the Secretary of State plans to make a decision on the water resources management plan and whether he will take the Teddington project out of it?
Robbie Moore
This follows on from a conversation I had with the hon. Lady and her constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney). We are well aware of Thames Water’s proposals for this scheme, which is still in a consultation stage. It is one of 17 strategic water resources options being considered across the Thames catchment, and I will be updated by Thames Water, as will the Secretary of State, when it has completed its consultation.
Water Companies: Executive Bonuses
Debate between Munira Wilson and Robbie Moore(4 months, 3 weeks ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Robbie Moore)
The Government welcome the opportunity to set out the scale of our action to tackle water quality. We have been consistently clear that the failure of water companies to reduce sewage discharge adequately is completely unacceptable. We made that clear throughout the debate and in the opening remarks from the Treasury Bench. I thank the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow), who previously held the water quality brief and did a lot of work to bring forward the Environment Act 2021.
The Government have clearly set out that we are taking strong and decisive action to reduce sewage discharges that harm our rivers and coastlines. I am aware of and recognise the many concerns that our constituents raise regarding water quality. They, like all of us in this House, rightly want to see the quality of our waters improve. That is why the Conservative Government are taking action.
We introduced the Environment Act, which introduced legally binding targets for water quality and a new requirement for water companies to publish data on storm overflows, and gave Ofwat new powers to clamp down on dividends and bonuses. Those are the actions of this Conservative Government in introducing the Environment Act. Many Opposition Members did not vote for many of the measures included in that Act. That is what this Government are doing in taking action.
Munira Wilson
I welcome the Minister to his new role. I thank him for giving way, given that the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow), who opened the debate, repeatedly refused to take any interventions from me.
The Minister talks about the importance that our constituents place on water quality, so I have one request for him. Sitting on the Secretary of State’s desk—as the hon. Member for Taunton Deane knows, because she responded to my debate on this topic in September—is the water resources management plan for the south-east. It contains the highly controversial proposal for the Teddington direct river abstraction, which will see recycled sewage put into the River Thames and water taken out. There are real concerns in the Environment Agency about water quality. Moormead Park in my constituency, and Ham Lands in that of my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney), face being ripped up to build the scheme. The Secretary of State has to make a decision, so will the Minister ask him to take that scheme off the table?
Robbie Moore
I noted that the hon. Lady was not here for the whole debate to listen to the many positive contributions from the Conservative Benches. However, we have already spoken about this, and we have a meeting in the diary next week to discuss it, which I look forward to.
Our plan for water focuses specifically on increased investment, which includes £2.2 billion from water companies to spend on improving infrastructure; stronger regulation, including more Environment Agency inspections of waste water treatment works; banning the sale of wet wipes; proposals for new restrictions on forever chemicals that can be found in waters; and tougher enforcement, including bigger penalties for water companies and tighter control over their dividend payments. Let me be clear: the Government will hold the water sector and enforcement agencies to account. The Secretary of State and I are working closely with the new leadership of the Environment Agency to ensure and reiterate to them and the water industry the expectation that they will be held to account and to the highest possible standards.
I will be glad to respond now to the many points that have been made by Members from across the House, starting with storm overflows, which many Members talked about. The Government are taking steps to prioritise storm overflows. We have now launched the most ambitious plan to address storm overflow sewage discharges by driving the largest infrastructure programme in water company history. We have been consistently clear that the failure of water companies to reduce sewage discharges adequately is totally unacceptable, and our new strict targets, which were brought out through the Environment Act, will see the toughest ever crackdown on sewage spills.
However, that all starts with monitoring—monitoring is absolutely key if we are to carry out enforcement. The hon. Member for West Lancashire (Ashley Dalton) may claim that water was previously better quality, but how on earth does she know? In 2010, under the Labour Administration, just 7% of storm overflows were being monitored; now, in 2023, we have driven that figure up to 91%, and by the end of this year we will be at 100%. The Opposition may make these ridiculous claims, but how on earth do they know? Under their watch, only 7% of storm overflows were being monitored. These monitors will allow us to understand the impact of sewage discharges in more detail than ever before, so we will hold water companies to account and target improvements where they are most needed.
To pick up on the point that was made by my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), it was the Labour Administration who introduced self-monitoring. It is Labour’s plan now to overturn one of the rules that it itself brought in. This Government have passed the Environment Act, which has required a landmark £6 billion investment through the storm-overflow reduction plan. We have instructed water companies to deliver more than 800 storm-overflow improvements across the country, and we are delivering Europe’s largest infrastructure project through the Thames tideway tunnel to reduce storm overflows by 95% in the Thames Water region.
I will now turn to the performance of regulators, which has been mentioned by many Members from across the House, including the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Sarah Dyke). We are working with regulators to ensure they have the tools and resources they need to hold water companies to account: we have provided an extra £2.2 million per year to the EA specifically for water company enforcement activity, and in May 2023, we provided a £11.3 million funding increase to enable Ofwat to treble its enforcement capacity. We have legislated to introduce unlimited penalties for water companies that breach their environmental permits and to expand the range of offences for which penalties can be applied. Those changes will provide the Environment Agency with the tools it needs to hold water companies to account. I only hope that the Opposition welcome the unlimited penalties that this Conservative Government are bringing in.
As for what we are doing to focus on performance, in 2022, Ofwat announced provisional financial penalties of almost £135 million for underperformance, applying to 11 water companies. That money is rightly being returned to customers through water bills during the 2024-25 period. This Government are taking the polluter pays principle seriously—that is exactly what the provisions of the Environment Act bring into play. However, the answer is not a lengthy bureaucratic process carried out at the taxpayer’s expense to create an entirely new regulator, as the Opposition have proposed. That sums up what the Labour party is about: process, not progress. This Government are absolutely committed to ensuring that progress is made on improving water quality.
The issue of dividends has been raised by many Members, and I will pick up on some of the points that the hon. Members for Wakefield (Simon Lightwood) and for Easington (Grahame Morris) have mentioned. In March 2023, Ofwat announced new measures that will enable it to take enforcement action against water companies that do not link dividend payments to performance. That change will require water company boards to take account of their performance when deciding whether they make dividend payments; if the payment of dividends would risk the financial resilience of a company, Ofwat now has the power to stop that payment.
As a result of this Government’s giving more power to Ofwat, it has increased power to take enforcement action if dividends paid do not reflect performance. As for some of the points that have been made about Thames Water, we have seen today that Ofwat is investigating Thames Water, which shows that the powers this Government gave to Ofwat are already being utilised.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Munira Wilson and Robbie Moore(3 years, 3 months ago)
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Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)