How Can Your Business Help To Improve Water Quality?

The issue of water pollution across the UK has been a high-profile topic in recent years. The 2024 general election saw it being highlighted as a major campaign issue, with most parties proposing a range of measures to deal with it.

Having come to power, the Labour government enacted its own legislation to address the issue in the form of the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025.

This increased the power of the water regulators, including a new power to block bonuses for executives of offending companies, the power to bring criminal charges, automatic fines for offending companies and more monitoring of sewage outlets.

In the latest moves, one of those regulatory bodies, the Environment Agency (EA), has announced a large-scale expansion in the number of staff dedicated to tackling water pollution, including more enforcement officers, inspectors and lawyers.

What Has Been The Effect Of The Enlarged EA Water Inspection Regime?

This means:

•       The EA now has 195 people working on inspections, compared with 41 in 2023.
•       This has been made possible by a £153 million budget increase
•       It has been able to plan 10,000 water inspections for the 2025-26 financial year, with 8,000 of these now undertaken
•       4,700 individual improvement actions have been ordered as a result of these inspections
•       Water companies had to pay £6.9 million to meet enforcement undertakings last year

Highlighting the increases, the EA said: “Water company environmental performance has continued to decline in recent years and this has driven the need for stronger, more visible enforcement action.”

This poses an interesting question for companies. If your water supplier is among the firms that have been in trouble for pollution shortcomings, do you rely on the beefed-up EA to bring them to heel, or should you seek to act yourself?

Part of the answer may lie in an examination of your supplier’s track record. If they have had just one significant incident and were fully compliant with the enforcement notice, that may be forgiven.

If, however, they are repeat offenders, you may decide to switch water supplier. The loss of custom may be the only way to make the penny drop and add the extra punishment on top of any fines and blocked bonuses already imposed.

What Can Businesses Do To Reduce Water Pollution?

However, you may want to go further. A key question is how effectively your water supplier will work with you to prevent any pollution incidents that may be connected to your business.

Could it be that waste products or even sewage connected with your premises might leak out through faulty pipes and get into local water courses? And might having a proactive supplier prevent this, or at least help identify problems and fix them?

There have certainly been many instances of pollution being caused not by the neglectfulness of the water supplier, but by failings at commercial premises.

For example, a year ago, there was the case of a pollution incident caused by emissions from the Wensleydale creamery in Hawes.

The cheese made at the site may have a famous association with Wallace and Gromit, but there was nothing “cracking” about the discharge of milk into the nearby Gayle Beck.

It was the second time in three years that a pollution incident had been linked to the plant (although the 2023 incident was not conclusively connected to the creamery) and owners Saputo Dairy UK admitted the problem.

A spokesperson said that extensive work had been carried out over the previous few years “to remedy historical issues regarding unintended discharge to the river”.

However, he added: “After recent investigations, we unfortunately discovered a failure in the drainage system at the creamery,” insisting that this had now been resolved and that action would be taken to stop it happening again.

Could A New Supplier Help You Cut Water Pollution?

This goes to show that when pollution occurs, it is important to be aware of your own responsibility as well as that of your water supplier, but also useful to see how they may be able to help.

If you are thinking of switching, there are several questions you should ask about your possible new supplier:

•       Would your new supplier give you a good value-for-money deal?
•       Do they have a good track record in preventing pollution, or a bad one?
•       Are they proactive in helping customers take steps themselves to prevent pollution?
•       Will they also be proactive in helping deal with other issues, such as preventing waste and helping you with storage or alternative water sources like wells for times of drought?

Ultimately, the aim should be to get a good deal for your company while also making sure as much as possible that everybody is doing all they can to prevent water pollution.