Water bills frozen

Tuesday July 28, 2009

Thames Water has been told to freeze bills for the next five years - but the company is still determined to plough ahead with its £2.2billion super sewer.

The decision by water regulator Ofwat has been welcomed by H&F Council as a recognition that household budgets, already under pressure in the recession, cannot meet repeated price hikes by the water giant.

But Thames Water refuses to ditch the costly and controversial Thames Tideway Tunnel, otherwise known as the super sewer.

Instead it claims that the ruling means it will have to scrap half its planned work on replacing Victorian mains, increasing the risk of burst pipes and the amount of water lost to leaks.

H&F Council leader Stephen Greenhalgh said: "Ofwat's decision is a victory for common sense and I am delighted that they have ruled that hard-working residents will not be the ones lumbered with the astronomical cost hikes. Now is the time for Thames Water to see the light and scrap the super sewer once and for all.

While a Thames Water spokesperson confirmed to the council that it still planned to construct the super sewer, chief executive David Owens said: "It's early days, but initial indications suggest today's decision may not allow us to deliver what our customers want in the future. For example, this means we won't be able to reduce leakage at all over the next five years.

"We've said all along, a tough decision for Thames is simply a tough result for customers. We're not prepared to cut corners on essential work but we're not `gold-plating' either."

The council believes that the cost of the super sewer hugely outweighs its benefits and it is likely that it will end up over budget and over time.

"Let us not forget that Thames Water has already put up bills by a third in the past five years and, if that was not enough, it has just posted profits of £605million - the highest ever by a British water supplier," added Cllr Greenhalgh. "With those kind of profits, Thames Water should still be able to fix broken mains like the ones in Richmond Way and improve the problem of basement flooding for residents by modernising the Counters Creek sewer."

Thames Water has even admitted that raw sewage will still continue to flow into the river even after the billions spent on this project. The council says the firm should concentrate on finding an answer to the basement flooding problems that are constantly blighting the lives of residents of riverside boroughs such as H&F.

The vast construction site for the entrance to the tunnel, which is likely to be in the borough, will be the size of four football pitches and in addition to that there could be a number of smaller sites dug in parks in both locally and throughout the capital.

Cllr Greenhalgh said: "Of course we are in favour of cleaning up the Thames, but there must be a less expensive and less disruptive alternatives than the super sewer. "This scheme is driven by the threat of EU fines but the certainty of those fines is arguable."

Read more on the super sewer proposals and tell us what you think»