Water Sector Clean Up

LEGISLATION to crack down on bosses polluting the estuary in Southend is set to become law, after successfully being voted through the House of Commons.

 David Burton-Sampson, MP for Southend West & Leigh, says the Water Bill will deliver the most significant increase in enforcement powers in a decade, to ban bonuses and impose tougher penalties for law-breaking, including imprisonment for water bosses.

  Mr Burton-Sampson said: “After 14 years of Conservative failure, sewage spills are still seeping into our estuary, which is why this Labour government has introduced immediate action to end it.

 “In the future, water executives will be penalised if they continue pumping out toxic waste.

 “If they refuse to comply, they could end up in the dock and face prison time.”

  The MP explained that the Bill delivers on the manifesto pledges to clean up the water sector, including significantly increasing the ability of the Environment Agency to bring forward criminal charges against law- breaking water executives.

 It will create new tougher penalties, including imprisonment, for water executives, when companies fail to co-operate or obstruct investigations.

 Other measures in the Bill include, the introduction of independent monitoring of every sewage outlet, with water companies required to publish real-time data for all emergency overflows. Discharges will have to be reported within an hour of the initial spill.

 He added: “This Bill is a major step forward in our wider reform to fix the broken water system.

 “The Labour Government will outline further legislation to fundamentally transform how the water industry is run and speed up the delivery of upgrades to our sewage infrastructure to clean up our waters for good.

 “I am delighted to say we will be holding our first Water Summit of the year in Southend, to hold local stakeholders to account and see what progress has been made and I welcome this Bill, which strengthens our hand, to make sure the people of Southend get the clean bathing waters they deserve”.

The new legislation will also ban the payment of bonuses to water bosses if they fail to meet high standards to protect the environment, their consumers and their company’s finances.

 There will be severe and automatic fines for a range of offences, including the issuing of penalties more quickly, without having to direct resources to lengthy investigations.

 

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