A look at some of the options after PM is urged to consider radical alternatives to deal with stricken company

Andy Burnham has told officials to rip up their plans for how to fix Thames Water and present him with more radical options for what to do with the stricken company. Here are some ideas the prime minister is being urged to consider.

Stricken UK water supplier lines up John Hutton as independent chair designate if takeover goes ahead

The group of Thames Water creditors pursuing a £10bn rescue deal for Britain’s largest water supplier has lined up a former senior Labour minister to chair the company, as it tries to win over the government.

The creditor consortium, called London & Valley Water, said on Tuesday that Lord John Hutton had been selected as independent chair designate of the Thames Water board, if the consortium’s deal is approved.

Exclusive: Utility seen as ‘litmus test’ of PM’s promise to bring ‘essentials of life’ under public control

Andy Burnham has told officials to rip up their plans for how to fix Thames Water and present him with more radical options for what to do with the stricken company.

In an early test of his promise to bring “the essentials of life” under public control, the prime minister is urging his advisers to go back to the drawing board and create a new list of policies for the utility.

If ‘public control’ bit is delaying overhaul, that needs to be nailed down sharpish or continued uncertainty could be costly

It is strange now to recall that Thames Water had a prominent slot on what was known as “Sue’s shit list” – the internal Labour dossier, compiled by Keir Starmer’s first chief of staff, Sue Gray, of potential crises that could erupt at short notice and force the incoming administration to make some big decisions quickly.

That was July 2024. Here we are – more than two years later – and the Thames script has barely advanced. We’re still waiting to see if the financial crisis at the over-indebted, under-performing water company will be resolved by a creditor-led recapitalisation, special administration or something else.

Water company tells creditors it will not survive long enough to agree refinancing deal without more money

Thames Water has asked its creditors for another £2.4bn as the embattled water company comes close to running out of cash.

The UK’s largest water company said on Thursday it needed another short-term cash injection because it would be unable to reach a longer-term deal to sort out its giant debt pile before running out of cash by “the end of 2026 or the start of 2027”.

Yorkshire and Thames among providers facing penalties for missing performance targets, but bills could rise elsewhere

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Thames Water, Yorkshire Water and other providers could be forced to cut tens of millions of pounds from household bills after the regulator said they had missed performance targets.

Customer bills at Yorkshire Water could fall by £27 on average, while those at Thames could decrease by £7, according to estimates by Ofwat, the regulator of the privatised industry in England and Wales.

Exclusive: Firms made more than £340m last year from processing industrial and commercial wastewater at sewage works that are unable to remove many chemical pollutants

Water companies in the UK made more than £340m in revenue last year by pouring billions of litres of industrial and commercial wastewater into sewage treatment works that experts say are not designed to remove most chemicals, leaving pollutants to pass into rivers, seas and farmland.

Water companies in England are required by law to take industrial wastewater and issue permits called “trade-effluent consents” that allow businesses to send it to sewage works, though water companies can refuse applications.

Competition watchdog clears takeover despite concerns that suppliers will have less incentive to lower bills

Almost three-quarters of households in Great Britain are now served by just three energy suppliers, after E.ON Next completed a deal to buy Ovo Energy despite fresh concerns about competition in the energy market.

The takeover concluded on Thursday after Britain’s competition watchdog cleared it, despite concerns that the shrinking number of household energy suppliers could mean bill payers will have less choice and suppliers will have less incentive to lower bills.

Owner of South West Water, Bristol Water and Bournemouth Water is tapping its investors for £550m after sewage spills

• South West Water owner taps investors after sewage spills

Water is “a service where the shareholders never lose and the public never win,” Andy Burnham, the prime minister, told the Labour party conference last week, reflecting the popular feeling towards the industry in England.

And, of course, his big-picture point is familiar: the £80bn, or thereabouts, that has been paid in dividends over the past 35 years represented over-the-top rewards for investors in many cases. It is easy to agree the public was taken for a ride.

Pennon slashes dividend and launches £550m cash call ‘to drive improved outcomes for customers and communities’

• Burnham, take note: water shareholders have their uses

The owner of embattled South West Water has slashed its dividend and launched a cash call to investors as it attempts to fund infrastructure investment, days after it was hit by a record £7.9m fine for hundreds of sewage spills.

London-listed Pennon said on Wednesday it would tap investors for £550m, as part of a £1bn investment “to drive improved outcomes for customers and communities”.

My family has spent four summers participating in demand response programs whereby utility companies pay customers to reduce energy use on the hottest summer days. Most summers have involved carefully precooling our New York City apartment before switching off the air conditioners and sweating it out during the designated demand response periods.

But this year, we kept our window air conditioners running throughout a heat dome event that drove daytime temperatures into the triple digits and made the nights oppressively hot. The difference was that we powered the air conditioners through two household batteries tucked away unobtrusively in the corners of our living room and bedroom.

We were among about 1,000 New York City households that took part in a free and growing program offered by the local startup Every Electric. The company’s proposition is simple: Get one or more batteries delivered to your home, plug the batteries into a standard wall electrical outlet, and then plug your window air conditioners into the batteries. Households can keep running air conditioners as usual during peak demand periods while also earning money through the local demand response program with the utility company Con Edison.

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