On Thursday 3rd April 2025 Sarah Olney MP spoke in a debate in the House of Commons regarding government support for Thames Water. 

She noted the high level of correspondence from her constituents regarding the significant rise in cost of their water bills. Despite executives continuing to receive hefty bonuses and shareholders taking billions of pounds in dividends out of the company, the burden to pay for the targets set by Ofwat has fallen onto Thames Water’s customers. She argued that it should not be the responsibility of bill payers to raise funds for Thames Water after greed and negligence has placed them into £19bn of debt. 

By their own admission senior managers of Thames Water acknowledge that many of their departments are understaffed, while they do not have the funds to invest in critical infrastructure to prevent leaks and sewage dumping into our rivers. During the debate, she raised the traffic chaos that has been caused in Kingston Vale over the past two years due to Thames Water’s reluctance to finance a new sewage pipe despite it repeatedly bursting. Thames Water have assured her that plans for the replacement of this pipe would be communicated by the end of March, but this is yet to happen.

She also raised her serious concerns about Thames Water’s disregard for our environment after a report showed that the company was responsible for 298,081 hours worth of sewage spills in 2024. In a recent BBC documentary, Thames Water staff members admitted to presenting favourable statistics when measuring the concentration of E. coli in the Thames. The cleanliness of our rivers should not be an exercise in PR, and it is extremely important that Thames Water are held to account for polluting our rivers.

She expressed the view that Thames Water should be placed into special administration.