Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent discussions her Department has had with (a) Ofwat and (b) other regulatory bodies on linking the pay of senior water company executives and directors to performance.

Government have been clear that companies must be transparent about aligning water company bonuses payment to delivery of services for customers, including environmental performance.

We have had discussions with Ofwat on company performance, including the need to increase transparency. We are pleased that, in December 2022, Ofwat strengthened its powers on executive pay awards by setting out that shareholders, and not customers, will fund pay awards where companies do not demonstrate their decisions on pay awards reflects overall performance. We support Ofwat’s new guidance on the scope and implementation of this new measure, published in March 2023.

This new measure will provide positive steps to protecting consumer interest and our environment.