As public outrage over sewage spills, rising bills and shareholder payouts reaches boiling point, a landmark review has called for a radical overhaul of how the water industry is regulated.
The Independent Water Commission, led by former Bank of England Deputy Governor Sir Jon Cunliffe, has recommended scrapping Ofwat entirely and replacing it, along with other regulators such as the Environment Agency and Natural England, with a single, powerful body.
The current system is “fragmented and overlapping”, the report argues, and has failed to keep companies in check as infrastructure crumbled and pollution soared.
Environment Secretary Steve Reed has said Ofwat is “clearly failing” and signalled he will act on the findings.
But would a single super-regulator really fix the system, or just shuffle responsibilities without addressing deeper problems?
Sir Jon has warned that bills will rise by nearly a third in the next five years, even with reform. Campaigners, meanwhile, continue to call for full public ownership, pointing to the £85bn paid out to shareholders since privatisation.
So what needs to change? Should regulation be overhauled – or the whole system taken back into public hands? And how do we make sure customers and the environment aren’t left paying the price?
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