Since becoming an MP, few issues have been raised with me as consistently, or with greater frustration, than the state of our rivers and the conduct of our water companies. In my constituency of Harrogate and Knaresborough, residents see the consequences every day. The River Nidd, Crimple Beck, and Oak Beck have all been hit by sewage outflows – once cherished parts of our landscape, now reduced to symbols of failure and neglect.
Repeated sewage discharges have damaged ecosystems, eroded public trust, and turned much-loved local waterways into potential health hazards. Parents warn their children not to paddle. Dog owners swap stories of sickness after walks along the riverbank. Even organisers of the Great Knaresborough Bed Race have faced the prospect of scrapping the water crossing over fears of participants’ health. Each of these examples shows how deeply this failure now affects everyday life in our community.
Yorkshire Water’s record makes for grim reading. In October 2025, the Environment Agency issued the company a red rating for serious pollution incidents, placing it among the worst performers in the country. This follows years of rising sewage discharges, repeated breaches and chronic underinvestment in essential infrastructure.
This failure is not confined to Yorkshire. It points to a systemic breakdown across the water industry. Thames Water and Southern Water have compiled similarly dismal records, if not worse. An Environmental Agency report in 2024 found that, alongside Yorkshire Water, these two companies were responsible for 81% of serious water pollution incidents in England. In parts of the South East, repeated outages have even left households without access to a basic service.
And yet, despite this record, customers are being asked to pay more for less. For Yorkshire Water’s customers, bills are expected to rise by as much as 41% over the next five years. This comes after a hosepipe ban lasting from July to December, restrictions that placed the burden on households even as pollution continued unabated. People are right to ask what exactly they are paying for, because it certainly is not improved service or cleaner rivers.
The attitude from the top only deepens that frustration. Yorkshire Water’s chief executive, Nicola Shaw, recently suggested that ‘levels of expectation from customers are too high.’ At a time of rising bills, collapsing trust and worsening pollution, that remark perfectly captures how disconnected the company’s leadership has become from the public it is meant to serve.
I welcomed the Water Special Measures Act introduced last year. It promised long-overdue reform: banning bonuses for failing bosses, imposing tougher penalties, introducing criminal liability and strengthening oversight of sewer outflows. On paper, it looked like a turning point. In practice, it has fallen far short.
Despite the Act’s limits on bonuses for failing companies, executives found ways to bypass them. Yorkshire Water channelled over £1 million to its chief executive through an offshore parent company, in addition to a near £700,000 salary – while pollution worsened, and trust fell away. It may not have violated the rules, but it exposed just how vulnerable the system is to exploitation.
The Water White Paper published this month acknowledges many of these failings. It accepts that the current regulatory framework has not worked, that Ofwat has lacked the authority to act, and that reactive crisis management must give way to genuine prevention. Its proposals for a new regulator, more rigorous inspections and greater transparency are welcome steps.
But its impact will depend entirely on delivery. The Government must ensure the new regulator is required to close executive‑pay loopholes, pursue criminal liability where serious environmental harm has occurred, and prevent customers from being forced to pay higher bills for deteriorating services.
We have now reached a point where change is unavoidable. Pollution on this scale is not accidental; it reflects sustained leadership failure, weak regulation and a system that has allowed profit to come before responsibility. Accountability must begin – and it must begin at the top.
Nicola Shaw should resign. In any other sector, rising bills, collapsing public confidence and one of the worst pollution records in the country would bring a chief executive’s tenure to an end. But while individual departures matter, they will not by themselves repair a broken system.
That is why reform must go further. Ofwat should be replaced with a regulator that has real authority – one able to close pay loopholes, intervene early, enforce the law robustly and pursue criminal consequences where water bosses have presided over illegal pollution. Regulation must no longer be something companies can sidestep.
Only then can we begin to restore trust, clean up our rivers and return our water system to serving the public interest – treating our waterways not as dumping grounds for sewage, but as assets for communities once again.
Polluted Rivers, Rising Bills, No Consequences: This System Is Broken
