A report in the Financial Times newspaper has suggested that consumers are now paying £2.3 billion per annum than would have been the case if the water companies had remained in public ownership. The article cites research undertaken by the University of Greenwich which it says has calculated the cost of privatisation to each household as over £100 a year and shows that the cost of maintaining and improving water and sewerage infrastructure In England has been paid for almost entirely by an increase in debt.

The researchers have suggested that the ownership and operation of water and sewerage services in England could be restructured as a local, democratic, publicly owned system. New public bodies should be created for each of the water regions, to take over the system and operate water and sewerage services using the existing workforce. Click here to read more