to think the water companies need to buck their ideas up

I really don’t think you are fair to the posters on this thread.

I don’t see entitlement, as in I will use as much as I want because I pay for it, I see posters worried about water supplies and the future, and hoping government and the water companies can address that.

I am very careful about my and my families water use, I try to use as little as possible and that’s why it’d frustrating when there is so much water wasted by leaks and inadequate infrastructure.

Where are the public educational campaigns? They are constantly put out by the company I work for yet people are still flushing wipes and sanitary products - people literally don't care, it's not their problem once it's flushed. Also when you try to educate people they tend to just start ranting about using as much water as they want because they pay for it and it rains all the time. Like on this thread.

Why do so few people have water butts? Lots of people I know have them for their gardens. My guess to the people who don't would be they don't want one. We literally gave them away for free a few years ago along with shower head aerators to reduce usage. People didn't want them.

Why are leaks so frequent and take so long to fix? Because every time the earth shifts of we get temperature extremes the pipes are pushed and pulled by the earth. Nobody can prevent that or create invincible pipes. They also get damaged by road works, building works etc. They take a long time to fix because you have to excavate the pipe to fix it which involves getting permits for road works and digging up roads. A lot of leaks are on private land which we aren't allowed to dig up and is not our responsibility to fix the leak but people.dont want to pay to repair leaks on their properties. There are creativity new ways of repairing pipes by putting sleeves in them so they don't need to be dug up and is much faster and cheaper but it's not always doable, it depends where the leak is. It is literally impossible to stop pipes everywhere leaking again. All we can do is repair them as they happen. Nothing is invincible, why do you expect pipes to be?

Where are the tariffs to promote efficient water use? What would this look like?

Is anyone auditing big industrial users? Yes.

As I said up thread it widely known that Thames water is an awful company and they are bottom of all the leader boards. We are often appalled at what Thames are doing in my company. Thames aren't representative of all water companies though, they are literally the worst example of one. And they folded because of it, and rightly so.

I don’t think anyone is saying you are cunts. It’s a massive failure in strategy going right back to the Thatcher era. The government should never have sold off something as vital as water - I’m absolutely fine with them having sold off British Airways.

It is ridiculous that our water is owned by foreign banks and similar.

The government should be overseeing the water companies closely and they don’t seem to be doing it at all. It has been clear for many years that the population is growing due to immigration and people living longer. Successive governments have failed to ensure that a proper plan is being put in place. Climate change is a similar story.

it is has been entirely predictable for many years that the demand for water would increase but little or nothing has been done to increase the supply or reduce the demand.

Where are the public educational campaigns? Why do so few people have water butts? Why are leaks so frequent and take so long to fix? Where are the tariffs to promote efficient water use? Is anyone auditing big industrial users?

Oh and the PR sheet you posted is written by Water UK which is just a lobby group for the privatised water company. It’s not worth the paper it’s (not) printed on. I’ll take the word of investigators such as Radio 4’s ‘The Briefing Room’ over those of water industry shills thanks.

In clean water leaks they sniff out the chlorine!

What’s your opinion on the fact that foreign private equity firms and banks like Macquarie loaded up UK water companies with debt to pay themselves huge dividends and as a result the companies are now paying more to service the debts than they are investing in improvements? Thames Water currently has £23Bn of debt that it is paying interest on. When it was privatised it was debt free.

That's so cool!

lak they're trained to smell for waste water;
"The dogs rapidly screen large areas of the network and detect even very low concentrations of contamination.
The dogs support both reactive investigations (known issues) and proactive work, helping assess the health of surface water systems and identify previously unknown sources of pollution.
They highlight areas of concern, enabling targeted follow-up investigations. This allows us to trace how contaminants have entered the network and act quickly."

always I saw those clever dogs on the local news!

If only there was a way to improve/repair reservoirs, oh there was last year when they were all empty. They'd rather repair than prevent issues so their shareholders and bosses can rake in gigantic bonuses. The way they operate is shameful.

That's clever!

Do the dogs do it by listening for leaking water or what?

Believe it or not our company has leakage dogs. They detect leaks it’s amazing!

Yes, there a whole teams dedicated to that, very large ones. The innovation being done year on year to invent new ways to locate leaks is incredible! Drones are used to follow underground pipes and find leaks in some pioneering areas at the moment. Hopefully it takes off.

That investment is happening though as I posted up thread.

My favourite fact to tell people is that actually MORE money is invested since privatisation than when it was nationalised.

Here are some great myths debunked. I urge everyone on this thread who thinks nothing is being done to read it.

UK Water Industry: Myths vs. Facts | Water UK https://share.google/AxkrFm3dYhbHPNro3

They absolutely do. Whenever I tell anyone where I work they literally scowl at me and say "oh, them lot that chuck shit in the river".

Well no, I don't personally drive a truck of shit to the river and dump it in, no. You'd think we shat on their front lawns the way they look and speak to us sometimes!

If the cretins could understand what I actually do and I how I keep them and their family safe everyday by making sure they have clean water to drink maybe they wouldn't treat me like that, but they clearly don't know that.

It's widely known that Thames water are the worst performing company, they are bottom of every league table.

We've been told not to wear our lanyards off-site even if just popping out to grab a sandwich, because of the risk of us getting abused, so yes, lots of people do blame the lowly water company workers.

I don’t think that of you.
I do however think that of the fat cats etc who get paid a princely salary and then take a bonus on top for a piss poor service are bang out of order.
I’m in the south east and SE water seems to be my new BFF with all the messages they keep sending me (re leaks here, there and everywhere). Pretty much daily at the moment.
They should lower their bloody salaries and bonuses etc and start to bloody invest in the failing infrastructure!
Housing estates are popping up everywhere and everyone is supposed to be drinking from the same cup. It’s madness!
Someone on my local radio show this morning, said that the Kent based reservoirs were full and yet there are countless homes in that county that are still without water, days after the initial problem!
The government needs to stop demanding counties build houses until they can bloody address the lack of supply and infrastructure with the water companies!

I’m south west water too and also thought we were the most expensive and last year’s increase was 30%.

Totally sat here wondering if the other water industry workers posting are actually my colleagues ha!

That's appalling. I hope they get a huge fine and that the directors have to forego dividends for years.

I don't think anyone blames individual staff for the problems that occur, but senior management and (especially) directors who prefer to take bonuses and pay dividends rather than invest in infrastructure, and their private equity paymasters.

I'm old, so I can remember the days when we had nationalised water companies, including some tiny ones like Croydon and East Surrey. Croydon covered a tiny area (I don't even think it was the whole borough) and had a team of 22 inspectors who went around the borough checking for leaks, fixing any that were their responsibility and reporting those on private property. People who had dripping taps or other leaks in their properties would get a letter notifying them and asking them to fix it, and if they repeatedly ignored them, they were eventually threatened with prosecution. Does work like that still go on? I've never heard of anyone being notified of a leak on their property since privatisation.

The water companies are mostly owned by foreign private equity companies who have effectively used them as leveraged debt vehicles. Macquarie Bank for example bought Thames Water, took out £10Bn (yes billion!) of debt which it then paid to itself as dividends and then did a runner.

The water regulator is toothless because it was deliberately set up by the government to only be able to regulate what the water companies do, not how they are owned, run, and financed. As a result, they became ideal vehicles for what is a form of legalised money laundering and theft.

It’s pretty much the biggest scandal of
privatisation and no one has a plan to fix it. Meanwhile, sewage is dumped in our rivers, roads are destroyed by mains leaks, and reservoirs run dry.

It is so hard being a water company employee at the moment. Everyone hates this kind of situation and is doing absolutely everything possible to resolve it.
I also think there is a genuine lack of understanding from the public about how the water supply actually works. I've seen so many comments in the last few days about how SE water have 'switched off' the water again, when in reality it seems the water has been used up by customers closer to the supply before it can reach those on higher ground.
I don't think water companies help themsellves though, I've seen statements issued saying there is trouble keeping the service reservoirs at a decent level, without explaining that this is not the same thing as a reservoir used for catching and storing rainfall. In fact a service reservoir is where treated drinking water is briefly stored after it is treated ready to go into supply to customers. These can empty rapidly at periods of high demand such as this recent heatwave, and if demand is very high the process of treating the water can't keep up to maintain supply.
At the moment the public and media view of the water industry is so negative it is impossible to see how it can be changed.