The chairman of the UK’s greatest water firm has apologised to clients however defended workers bonus funds.
Sir Adrian Montague, of Thames Water, instructed MPs on the Surroundings, Meals and Rural Affairs choose committee that the utility agency, which provides 16 million clients in London and components of south England, was sorry.
He mentioned: “We know the supply interruptions cause inconvenience and sometimes real hardship, and so I think the right thing to do is to start the discussion of the [company’s] turnaround plan by acknowledging we haven’t always served our customers as well as we should, and through the committee, apologising to them.”
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Thames Water’s chairman Sir Adrian Montague seems earlier than the Surroundings, Meals and Rural Affairs choose committee. Pic: PA/Home of Commons/UK Parliament
Clients confronted important service disruption in recent times, together with a boil water discover in Bramley, close to Guildford, final summer season and a 40% rise in sewage spills in 2024.
It is also struggled to boost funding, repay its debt pile, which now stands at £19bn after an emergency mortgage prevented it from working out of cash and getting into state management.
Regardless of the large debt pile, Sir Adrian defended paying bonuses, saying the corporate was in “a competitive marketplace” and “we have to keep staff”.
“It’s true that this business, like many businesses, needs to reward its staff effectively”, he instructed committee members. “We do need to reward [staff] competitively.”
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If bonuses weren’t paid, “people will come knocking, they’ll try to pick out of us the best staff we’ve got”, Sir Adrian added.
“But the amounts of bonuses paid to staff is very small compared with the capital cost of the works that we were considering,” he mentioned.
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Thames Water’s chief government Chris Weston seems earlier than the choose committee. Pic: PA/Home of Commons/UK Parliament
Within the first three months of his tenure, which started in January 2024, Thames Water’s chief government Chris Weston accepted a bonus of £195,000 as a part of his £2.3m pay package deal.
His bonus may be as much as 156% of his wage as a bonus, whereas frontline staff can solely earn between 3% and 6%, he mentioned.
Buyer payments are to rise 35% to about £588 yearly per family by 2030, a determine which Thames Water is in search of to extend.
