Southern Water: UK water firm proposes 73% hike to bills for its customers - then pays its chief 'sickening' £183k bonus

Southern Water customers will still face the largest increase in water bills of all firms in England and Wales, the regulator has confirmed. Household annual water bills for Southern Water customers, which provides water supply to much of West Sussex, as well as wastewater treatment for much of East and West Sussex, will rise by an average of £183 in the five years.

Meanwhile, for South East Water, which supplies water to customers in East Sussex, average bills will increase by just £18. However, Southern Water’s increase to bills is a lot less than what the firm was actually hoping for. Southern Water had proposed a rise of almost 73% but it was rejected.

Now, it has emerged, that the water firm who was proposing to hike customer’s water bills the most, has paid its chief a huge bonus of £183,000. The chief also gets a £764,000 salary including the bonus.

One user posted on X, formerly Twitter, that it is “quite sickening” while another said “ludicrous overpayment for gross underperformance”.

A third added: “Corporate Greed!!! Meanwhile last evening, in awful weather, we had two long standing hard working Southern Water employees, trying to be the customer facing element of the Co, come to talk about sewer blockages etc and answer questions at our local Climate Group.”

It comes as Environment Secretary Steve Reed promised steps towards “ending the crisis in the water sector”, including so-called customer panels to “hold (bosses) to account”. Southern Water said its bills have been kept low and the average combined water and wastewater bill has increased by only £2 in the past 10 years in nominal terms. It said it has been charging "far less" than other comparative water companies.

It added that it has a "unique combinations of hurdles to overcome", with aims to "drastically cutting the use of storm overflows along our hundreds of miles of coastline and inland waterways", which it said will take time and a lot of money to tackle. Stuart Ledger, Southern Water’s chief financial officer, said: "Since submitting our business plan in October, we have continued to engage with stakeholders and customers, to feed into Ofwat’s process. We are now reviewing Ofwat’s Draft Determination, and we will publish our response on 28 August 2024, ahead of Ofwat’s Final Determination in December 2024."

On the chief’s bonus, a spokesperson for Southern Water said: “Having declined a bonus last year, Southern Water’s CEO and CFO will receive a partial bonus in 2024, paid by shareholders rather than from customer’s bills, after the Board’s Remuneration Committee acknowledged progress made in delivering on the company’s ambitious Turnaround Plan. Despite the region’s wettest year on record, the Committee highlighted significant advances in treated water quality, a reduction in overall pollution numbers, and falling customer complaints, but also recognised areas where further progress is needed.”