- Package to be paid by the company and its shareholders, for
the benefit of the environment and customers.
- The company will also be required to rectify any identified
breaches and ensure its future compliance.
- Six wastewater cases have now been closed in 2025, with more
than £250m in fines and redress confirmed.
Ofwat has confirmed that Wessex Water will fund an £11m
enforcement package after the company failed to operate, maintain
and upgrade its wastewater network adequately to ensure that they
could cope with the flows of sewage and wastewater.
The package follows our proposed decision announced on 11
November and a 21-day consultation period where customers and
stakeholders could feedback on the draft decision.
This investment will be paid for by the company and its
shareholders and not through customer bills. It is over and above
the investment Wessex Water is required to deliver under the
price review and separate from the steps the company will need to
take to become compliant.
The package includes:
- Helping private landowners to seal their sewer pipes to
prevent unnecessary groundwater reaching Wessex Water's network;
- Reducing spills at specific storm overflows through
investment which would have otherwise occurred beyond 2030;
- Installing additional monitoring equipment to better enable
management of flows at treatment works and storm overflows;
- Helping customers to sustainably manage rainwater at their
properties.
Lynn Parker, Senior Director for Enforcement at Ofwat, said:
“We are pleased with the conclusion of Wessex Water's case. This
is the sixth case completed in our wider wastewater
investigation, which during 2025 has resulted in Ofwat securing
£250m in fines and enforcement packages. These cases are a
crucial part of holding water companies to account and driving
the transformation of the water sector that the public wants to
see.”
Notes for editors
- You can find a link to the relevant enforcement documents
here: Enforcement cases -
Ofwat
- Ofwat can impose financial penalties of up to 10% of a
company's relevant turnover. In deciding whether to impose a
penalty and the level of that penalty, Ofwat will take account of
the particular facts and circumstances of the case under
consideration to establish the appropriate level of penalty to
impose.
- Had this enforcement package not been accepted, Ofwat would
have imposed a penalty where the money would have been returned
to the Consolidated Fund operated by HM Treasury.
- The £11m enforcement package is greater than the penalty
Ofwat would otherwise have imposed on the company (which would be
£10m, or 2.5% of Wessex Water's annual turnover).
- Instead, the undertakings would mean that the money will
remain in the water sector and be spent on making improvements
for the benefit of Wessex Water's customers and the local
environment.
