Water Industry (Regulation and Renationalisation) Bill 

A Bill to make provision about the structure, ownership and regulation of the water industry; to allow, and in specified circumstances require the Secretary of State to bring water assets into public ownership; to provide for the recovery of dividends; to provide for monitoring of water quality; to set a target for the reduction of sewage discharges; to provide for financial penalties in relation to sewage discharges and breaches of monitoring requirements; to require the Secretary of State to publish a strategy for the reduction of sewage discharges from storm overflows, including an economic impact assessment; and for connected purposes.

My new bill is an only slightly amended version of a bill first put forward in the House of Commons last year by Jim McMahon MP and I am indebted to him for allowing me to borrow the wording. The Labour Party aim to provide tougher regulation of the water industry, my addition to this approach is to turn the water company fines into government share holdings.

My view is that the water companies are environmentally insolvent: they simply can’t meet their environmental obligations while still remaining viable private companies. This situation has come about because of decades of under investment combined with customer’s money being given to shareholders. If tighter regulations on dumping sewage into rivers and coastlines are enforced, then the companies will inevitably face regular fines. Rather than these fines being passed onto customers in the form of higher bills, they should instead be paid in the form of public shareholdings. This will lead to the transfer of ownership back to democratic control.