Yorkshire Water being forced to pay out £40m over sewage failings is indicative of damage done

The company being forced to pay out £40m to address failings over wastewater and sewage by the regulator is indicative of the damage that it has done.

Ofwat’s probe found that there were “serious failures” over how Yorkshire Water operated and maintained its sewage network, resulting in excessive spills from storm overflows.

It will pay out £36.6m over the next five years to prioritise work on particularly problematic storm overflows in environmentally-sensitive areas.

Surely Yorkshire Water should have been putting money towards fixing these issues without the need for the regulator to intervene?

Any responsible business would put the health of the environment at the forefront of priorities, not least one that is reliant on it.

Little wonder there is widespread anger at Yorkshire Water in the region. In fairness it is not just Yorkshire Water but rather an industry-wide rot that has set in. With water companies up and down the country failing bill payers.

Yorkshire Water, which supplies more than five million customers, will also hand £3.4m of funding to the Great Yorkshire Rivers Partnership.

The cost of the £40m enforcement package will rightly not be passed on to Yorkshire Water’s customers in their bills, instead being paid for by the company and its shareholders.

Given the largesse enjoyed by shareholders and bosses at Yorkshire Water in the past, it is only right that the burden be taken on by the company.

The company’s CEO, Nicola Shaw, apologising and acknowledging that there is still more for it to do is also to be welcomed.

It should never have been allowed to get to this stage but now that it has, it’s on the water companies to fix the issue.