Water bosses could face prison for sewage dumping under planned law

Water bosses in England and Wales could be jailed for up to two years for covering up sewage dumping under proposed legislation.

- Helena Horton

At the moment, chief executives of water companies face fines for failing to comply with investigations by the Environment Agency and the Drinking Water Inspectorate, but there have been just three such fines since privatisation three decades ago.

Civil servants at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said yesterday they planned to tighten rules to force companies to hand over sewage data quickly, and that the maximum sentence for covering up this information or failing to release it would be two years.

Ministers also plan to pass legislation that would force water companies to pay the EA and DWI'S enforcement costs if they are under investigation. The EA has found it hard to inspect polluters owing to funding cuts, so ministers hope this would provide the money to increase the number of prosecutions. Defra has been looking for savings after the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, asked it for £1bn in spending reductions.

The legislation being introduced to parliament today would also give the regulators powers to ban bonuses for water company bosses who fail to meet environmental and consumer standards, and if their company is not financially resilient. These environmental standards had not yet been decided by the regulator, Ofwat.