Danny Chambers calls on Burnham to take on Southern Water sewage dumping

Liberal Democrat MP for Winchester, Danny Chambers, is demanding that Andy Burnham prioritises a common-sense overhaul of the broken water industry as one of his first acts as Prime Minister.

It follows new analysis of data revealing the devastating scale of environmental damage in the Winchester area, where Southern Water dumped sewage into chalk streams like the River Itchen and local waterways for a staggering 1139 hours last year across 126 separate spills.

Following years of environmental vandalism and unaffordable bill increases by Southern Water, the Winchester MP has called on the new administration to abandon the failed privatisation model and hand water infrastructure back to the public via a customer-owned mutual model.

Danny Chambers and the Liberal Democrats are calling on Prime Minister Andy Burnham to:

• Put water companies into special administration immediately, permanently restructuring the company as a mutual run for the benefit of its customers.
• 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 Winchester and Meon Valley areas 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 MP for Winchester, Danny Chambers, said:
"For years, people from Winchester and the Meon Valley have watched in anger as beautiful rivers like the Itchen, Meon and Test have been pumped full of filthy sewage, all while foreign asset managers and corporate executives pocket billions in dividends and bonuses.

"It is an absolute insult to local families that Southern Water has been jacking bills up by huge amounts while raking in enormous profits - all while our chalk streams and beautiful countryside get routinely trashed by their sewage dumping.

"Andy Burnham has a clear choice in his first weeks in Number 10 - stand up for communities like ours in Hampshire, or let the same broken system that is destroying our environment continue. 

“We need a clean break from the failed privatisation experiment - wiping the slate clean of the vulture capital debt that has been loaded on to our water companies. It’s past time we handed our water infrastructure back to the people who actually use and rely on it by forcing the water companies to become Public Benefit Corporations."