Matthew Green demands overhaul of broken water industry as South Shropshire sees 7,243 hours of spills in waterways

South Shropshire Liberal Democrat candidate Matthew Green is demanding that Andy Burnham make a radical overhaul of the broken water industry one of his first acts as Prime Minister.

It follows new analysis of data revealing the devastating scale of environmental damage in South Shropshire where Severn Trent Water dumped sewage into local waterways for a staggering 7,243 hours last year across 980 separate spills.

Following years of environmental vandalism and financial mismanagement by water firms, the Liberal Democrats are calling on the new administration to abandon the failed privatisation model and hand water infrastructure back to the public via a customer-owned
mutual model.

Specifically, the Liberal Democrats are calling on Prime Minister Andy Burnham to:

• Transition all existing water companies into public-benefit mutuals, owned by the people rather than the state, ensuring they are run for public health and the environment instead of private profit.

• Abolish the toothless regulator Ofwat and replace it with a powerful new Clean Water Authority with statutory powers to enforce strict environmental standards and crack down on repeat offenders in South Shropshire and across the country.

• End the Great Sewage Cover-Up by forcing water companies to report the volume, not just the duration, of sewage spills.

• Implement an immediate, legally binding ban on all water company executive bonuses, free from loopholes.

Liberal Democrat candidate for South Shropshire Matthew Green said: "People across South Shropshire are rightly furious at the way in which are our local rivers and waterways are being pumped full of sewage, while bills continue to rise, and foreign asset managers and corporate executives pocket billions.

"I’m calling on Andy Burnham to stand up for communities like ours in South Shropshire and make clear that the current broken, polluting system cannot continue.

“The privatisation experiment has failed. It’s time to wipe the slate clean of vulture capital debt and hand our water infrastructure back to the people who actually use and rely on it."