You've probably heard that a cold water outdoor swim can boost your immune system. Well, unfortunately, this might not necessarily be the case in UK waters. Although, your immune system will need to work its muscles significantly, to fight whatever it was you've picked up from the human waste that was loitering about your person.

 

Many of our waters are now comparable to the inhospitable planets you see in old post-apocalyptic sci-fi movies, thanks to the raw sewage that’s being pumped into them on a regular basis. If you google ‘raw sewage UK’, you’re faced with a burgeoning pit of grim news articles teeming with stories of polluted rivers, dying wildlife, virus riddled triathletes and conversely, excessive shareholder dividends.

 

So, why is it happening?

Both rain water and wastewater is collected in a combined sewage system across most of the UK. It then goes to a sewage treatment works. However, when there’s too much rainwater, the water companies are allowed to discharge overflow into rivers and seas, to avoid flooding in homes and roads.

 

But although it’s allowed, it shouldn't be happening as often as it has been recently, and we saw raw sewage dumped into our waters over 300,000 times just last year. According to Greenpeace, some of our most precious conservation sites have been hit by hundreds of sewage overspills, including the Lake District, and the Brecon Beacons.

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What’s being done about it? Is the Government looking into it?

In a way, yes… In 2021, 256 Conservatives voted to reject, yes, reject a proposal by the House of Lords that required water companies to reduce sewage discharges. So, technically they are doing something, but in a Disney villain kinda way. And in classic Scrooge McDuck fashion, they argued that it would cost too much to clean it up (perhaps if they and their altruism despising cronies paid the right amount of tax, we’d have enough money in the pot). This now means that water companies are allowed to pump sewage into our rivers and seas for another 15 years.

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Meanwhile, Environment secretary, Therese Coffey told MPs that it was cheaper for water companies to pay a fine than to deal with the issue. Adding that those who say they could end the problem (Labour) are “either detached from reality or being definitively dishonest with the public”.

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But will the fines really work?

The UK's largest water company, Thames Water, has already been fined £3.3m for pumping millions of litres of raw sewage into two rivers in 2017. They’re currently collapsing under a £14 billion debt – that’s 80% of the value of the business. So, is adding a fine and not clearing up the pollution really a better solution?

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How does a water company, a company we’re told to use, end up in such colossal debt?

Thames Water has been a privately owned company since 1989 when Margaret Thatcher sold off all publicly owned water and sewage companies, claiming it would ‘lead to a new era of investment in England’s water infrastructure.’

 

The new era…

​​Thames Water had no debt when they were first privatised. However, they’ve since borrowed £52bn and paid out £72bn in dividends, while the bankers who are analysing the company’s gargantuan debt, have stated that the company might require £10bn just to get up to regulatory standards. This doesn’t even include the interest they’ll rack up in the process.

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In other words, while we’ve watched our bills rise by 40% since the privatisation, and are swimming in literal sh*%, the shareholders get to bathe in handsome returns.

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Speaking in Parliament, Green Party leader Caroline Lucas, said, 'Privatisation of water was a serious mistake and it needs to be permanently rectified.'

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Why did investors even want to own our water?

The water industry isn’t really an attractive prospect for private investors – mainly because they can’t just cut off supply when things get a bit spenny. However, by privatising and allowing regulatory nonsense (neo liberalism at it again), the government have preened, coiffured and waxed it to make it appeal to asset management companies. After all, who wouldn’t want to invest in something where it’s really easy to increase tariffs and make millions of people gradually pay more for a UN recognised human right that’s fundamental to our health? Or where you can reduce spending on maintaining and improving the core business by 15%, while upholding an average CEO pay out of £1.7 million a year?

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What could happen if we made it public again?

We Own It, who campaigns against privatisation and for 21st century public ownership, explains on their website,

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‘Bringing water into public ownership would save us £1.8 billion a year on shareholder dividends alone. If we compensated shareholders for £18 billion – which would be MORE than the £15 billion they’ve put in to the industry – this proposal would pay for itself in 10 years.’

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‘After 10 years we could use the money we’ve saved to cut everyone’s water bills, invest in infrastructure or pay off some of that debt mountain the private sector has racked up. Then we can sit back and enjoy having water that belongs to all of us and accountable water companies that put people before profit!'

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Which explains why, in a recent YouGov survey, 69% of us want to take it back into our hands.

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Won’t it mean more money out of our pocket?

Not necessarily. The government have the power to issue an enforcement order against the company, and can control how and when they pay their shareholders and carry out their investment. This could take years but it at least means no public money has gone to yet another private company who couldn’t even run a village fete cake stand if their offshore bank accounts depended on it.

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What’s next?

There is an alleged new plan on the horizon, which will enforce tougher penalties on water companies. That money should then be reinvested into a new water restoration fund. But, with the taskforce set up to tackle the issue only meeting once this year - when it should’ve been a fortnightly meeting - it doesn’t seem like there’s much  urgency surrounding this dire state of affairs.

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There’s also a question around Thames Water and what’s going to happen to their ever growing pile of debt. Because currently, it seems to us that they’re either busy throwing away money on fruitless TV ad campaigns targeted at an audience who either doesn’t use them, or doesn’t have a choice but to use them, or distracted elsewhere, tenderly rubbing their hand up the inner thigh of their shareholders.

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Taking these companies back into public ownership is the prime candidate in the eyes of most of the public. But is this likely with a government who voted against reducing sewage spillages? Are we being naïve and entitled, expecting some kind of utopic paradise where our rivers and coastlines don't force you to play 'sea cucumber or human waste'? And where wildlife can swim about without disintegrating before our very eyes?

We'll withhold any optimism until we see some proof. Lest we feel the blunt force of disappointment once more. 

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If you liked the sound of taking back the water companies, you can follow and support the We Own It’s campaign and read about their work here.