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Six water firms in England ‘overcharged customers by up to £1.5bn’ (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 1 month ago by Emperor to c/uk_infrastructure

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Six water companies overcharged customers between £800m and £1.5bn by “significantly or systematically” underreporting the true scale of their sewage pollution of rivers and waterways, a tribunal has heard.

In the first environmental competition class action against water companies in England, lawyers argued that the privatised firms had abused their monopoly position to mislead regulators over the amount of sewage they were discharging from their assets over the past 10 years.

As a result, the companies, Thames Water, Yorkshire Water, Anglian Water, Severn Trent, Northumbrian Water and United Utilities, were able to charge customers higher bills than they would have been allowed to if they had provided the regulators with a true picture of their sewage pollution.

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[–] Emperor 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If they're underreporting (lying) so they can jack bills up higher then that seems like fraud. Grounds to privatise the whole lot of them, especially as they're monopolies.

[–] IcyToes@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Nationalise, you mean?

Definitely agree. Essential utilities should never be privatised.

Idk why but this gives collusion vibes. They were all of their own accord acting in this manner independently of one another?

[–] Emperor 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Nationalise, you mean?

Oops.

Idk why but this gives collusion vibes. They were all of their own accord acting in this manner independently of one another?

I feel that should be the focus of further investigation. It's possible that using a system where you self-report your sewage overflows was just asking for it to be gamed but it works better if a lot of them did it because there is then no odd outlier with suspiciously low numbers.

[–] IcyToes@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Agree on that point.

Whether it happens or not is another question. Some on the right of the Labour Party (which does have a significant presence on the front benches) were receiving funding from the water industry. How strong and effective that lobbying was/is, we will have to find out.