Thames Water’s chief executive has defended bosses sharing £770,000 in bonuses despite the firm battling a huge debt mountain and pumping out even more sewage.
Chris Weston insisted ‘competitive packages’ are needed to attract ‘talent’ to work at his crisis-stricken company even though regulators said the payouts were unjustified.
England’s biggest water company wants to increase bills for its 16 million customers by an eye-watering 59 per cent over the next five years.
It today reported a profit before tax of £249.6million in the six months to September – up more than 20 per cent on the same period last year.
Thames Water also admitted it had overseen a 40 per cent rise in sewage pollution to 359 incidents in the first half of 2024.
Mr Weston took on the job in January and was awarded a £195,000 bonus for his first three months at the firm.
Ofwat revealed last month that Thames Water was planning to use customer cash to pay bosses’ bonuses, but ruled that it was not ‘justified’.
The firm is in about £16billion of debt and is trying to secure another £3billion to keep it running beyond mid-next year.
It faces a crunch decision from Ofwat next week, as the regulator decides whether to allow the proposed increase in customers bills.
Thames Water bosses have argued they need the extra money to make the firm ‘investible’ enough to attract funding, and to pay for improvements to its network of pipes and sewers.
In his defence of the bonuses, Mr Weston said: ‘We need to attract talent to this company.
‘If we don’t offer competitive packages, people will not come and work at Thames.’
‘I completely understand that there are customers out there who struggle with their bills,’ he added, as he pointed to bills support offered to about 377,000 customers in the last year.
Thames Water said that without emergency cash, expected to be in place by the end of January, it would run out of money in March, which is sooner than a previous estimate of late May.
Mr Weston blamed a particularly wet spring and summer period for the increase in sewage incidents and said problems with infrastructure were ‘decades in the making’.
‘It is going to require decades to fix it, to change the way that it operates, and a significant amount of money,’ he said.
Thames Water also revealed that it paid up to £51million in fees to advisers over the six-month period to September as it sought to secure an emergency funding package.
The Government faced fresh calls to put ‘broken’ Thames Water into special administration.
Liberal Democrat MP Tim Farron, the party’s environment spokesperson, said: ‘This latest shocking rise in sewage spills must be the final straw for Thames Water.
‘The Government must put this broken firm into special administration to give customers the fair deal they deserve.
‘Time and time again Thames Water has proved it is no longer fit for purpose and cannot be trusted with our precious waterways.
‘Whilst pumping out raw sewage and letting pollution incidents spiral out of control, Thames Water have lined their pockets, mismanaged infrastructure and overseen mounting debts.
‘It is unacceptable to continue coming up with excuses, and refusing to take responsibility for the absolute mess they’ve left .’