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INTERCEPTOR SEWER SYSTEM
- The failures of NWL in Sunderland extend beyond the STWs to the interceptor sewer which has yet to become fully operational. There are several areas of failure. At Seaburn there has twice been flooding of houses with sewage and storm water. Hylton Dene, a new designated environmental area, has had sewage released into it three times in the last 6 months. On May 28th a fishing competition at Hylton Dene had to be abandoned due to a large inundation of untreated sewage. The Combined Sewer Overflow at Whitburn (the terminus of the new system) has been discharging untreated sewage in excessive quantities for some time. This is in breach of the conditions of their licence but has elicited no action from the EA. The licence states that there will be no more than 70 discharges per annum. The figure given to the Local Authority (S. Tyneside) was not more than 20-30 times pa whilst some people had been assured that there would be no more than 2-3 discharges per year. The record shows that there were 157 discharges in the 3 months Jan- Mar 1998. Such excesses have been going on for some time to judge from the comments of a local diver who has transferred his diving training school to North West Scotland since the massive destruction of the flora and fauna off Whitburn Steels, which are now a desert.
NWL designed the interceptor sewer system to the lowest possible standards, a standard over 30 years old, a 1 in 5-year storm episode. It is clearly quite inadequate.
FINANCIAL CONSIDERATIONS
- NWL continues to threaten consumers and Local and County Authorities with massive increases in bills should they be required to improve treatment levels. This is totally unjustified.
- The finances of the NWL have been subject to very serious criticism by both independent analysts (the Shaoul Report, Parliamentary Select Committee) and more recently the Regulator. The main criticisms are
- There has been massive under investment by all the Water Companies in sewage treatment and new sewers and the like. The Regulator puts this at ~£1 billion.
- Large sums of money have been found unspent in their accounts, £105 million up to 1996 in the case of NWL. This sum would provide secondary treatment at all their major outfalls according to NWL.
- New financial estimates, by the Companies, have been 'over egged' by some 350% according to the Regulator- estimated increases in bills were £65 (Companies) and £18 (Regulator) over the next 5 years.
- Huge sums have been paid out in dividends,; the highest, 44% of profits, in the case of NWL
- All the Companies shares have been allowed to inflate well beyond the top FTSE 100 index. Over the first 5 years they were 35% above the FTSE 100.
- Considerable sums have been invested in developing non-core businesses over which the Regulator has no control.
- Unacceptable financial practices have been adopted whereby almost all the sub-contracts, by value, have been awarded to subsidiaries without any competitive tendering; over 98% by value by NWL in the first 7 years after privatisation.
- The Regulator has demanded that the present opaque accounting procedures and presentation of accounts, which are unacceptable, must be altered so that the public and other interested parties can readily identify important information in the accounts.
- NWL is now part of the second largest Water conglomerate in the world, Lyonnaise-des-Eaux -Suez. It is no longer quoted on the UK Stock Market and is now much less accessible to the British consumer. It has massive resources. This represents a quite unacceptable situation for the consumer and clearly demonstrates the exploitation of the public arising from privatisation of this monopoly.
- It needs to be recognised that once the major investment in new STWs and sewers is complete then the costs of the industry will fall very rapidly ensuring a highly profitable industry over the next 50-100 years.
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