Thames Water Fined 20Million

[emmie]

for dumping it's waste
how do they pay for it, will it be their customers who have to stump up the bill.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-39352755

[emmie]

wage poured onto Upper Thames Sailing Club's pontoon

Thames Water has been fined a record £20m after pumping nearly 1.5 billion litres of untreated sewage into the River Thames.
The company admitted water pollution and other offences at sewage facilities in Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire.

[bhg481]

Will it be their customers who have to stump up the bill? Who else is going to pay? They'll up their charges and there's nothing you can do about it as water supply is a monopoly; unlike electricity, gas etc, you can't change supplier. As a Thames Water customer I "look forward" to having my bills increased.

[Baldric]

///However, the fine amounts to a tiny proportion of the company's annual income. Thames Water makes an operating profit of around £2m every day///

But I bet the Bills still go up.

[emmie]

bhg
as am i, so more money to shell out. Bstards for doing it by the way..

[mikey4444]

This massive fine should be paid by the shareholders, not by the Customers. Cancel the dividend this and next, if needed, until the debt is paid.

In the link, it says ::::

"Judge Sheridan said the company had a "history of non-compliance" and that managers had ignored warnings and "risks identified by employees and others".

if that the case, than why were the individual managers not prosecuted ?

Why no "corporate" charge ?

[emmie]

no idea why they haven't been.

[mikey4444]

The comments from the Judge were extremely damning.

[douglas9401]

I heard a couple of comments earlier today, one was something about managers being retrained and the other, referring to that was that it was like shooting the soldiers to save the generals.

It was ever so, all the perks and none of the responsibility.

[mikey4444]

Lions led by donkeys perhaps Dougie !

[twix123]

mikey, I'm sure that you'll be pleased to know that the BT Pension Scheme owns 13% of the consortium formed to purchase Thames Water in 2006. Thus probably you can personally press for future dividends to be withheld until this fine is paid off.

[mikey4444]

Twix....what possible difference does that make ?

This company has been found guilty and will have too take the consequences. Personally, I still can't understand why managers were not prosecuted.

[RobNorth]

The numpties that allowed this to happen and continue for 3 years?
must have known they were dumping it into a really "affluent" area populated by people with clout who would not take sh-t from anyone...
I wonder if any of the original pre 2006 TW management are still there?

[mikey4444]

Twix....."the BT Pension Scheme owns 13% of the consortium"

So, presumably, that must mean that 87% of the shares are NOT owned by BT ?

[Baldric]

See BT squirm!

[mikey4444]

This affair is entirely the fault of Thames Water, not its shareholders, and the senior managers present at the time should have been brought to book.

[twix123]

mikey @ 17.29
//This massive fine should be paid by the shareholders, not by the Customers. Cancel the dividend this and next, if needed, until the debt is paid. //

But you say the the shareholders should pay up.

I agree that the management should also be bought to book, and forfeit any bonus scheme that they may share in, as an enforced Thames Water customer, I, like 15 million other TW customers should not have to pay, which ultimately we will.

[mikey4444]

Then I think we can meet halfway on this Twix !

[Tilly2]

It does say that the customers will not have to pay.

[mikey4444]

But can we rely on that Tilly ?

Who is to know if an extra 1% increase on bills, at sometime in the future, will be slipped in to pay this massive fine ?

Personally, I wouldn't trust them an inch !

[emmie]

neither would i, lets make these so and so's accountable.