Take Back Water.
@takebackwater
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It’s time to turn the tide on 40 years of privatisation and failure. We're building a movement to take back water.
Kemble
Joined May 2024
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Pinned Tweet
*IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT*
We gave the government 100 days to commit to taking water back into public hands. 100 days are now up and, instead of doing the right thing, Starmer has sided with water bosses and billionaire shareholders. 🧵
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🔥 "We've had enough of the greed, we've had enough of the exploitation. The rip off, it ends here and it ends today."
@Feargal_Sharkey
telling it how it is this morning 👇
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BBC London put out a search warrant for Thames Water bosses.
16 million customers are getting a 22% price hike and they won't even show their faces.
It's an absolute disgrace.
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It’s time to turn the tide on 40 years of privatisation and failure.
We’re building a movement to Take Back Water. 🧵
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🚨 Average water bills set to rise by £94 🚨
Water company bosses have run the industry into the ground. Now they're using our cash to bail themselves out.
Enough is enough.
We're building a movement to take back our water. Join today 👉
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REVEALED: 47% of the public supports non-payment targeting the privatised water industry, according to recent national polling.
🌊 Millions of us are ready to withhold our cash until every penny we pay goes into investing in and fixing the broken water system.
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We’re giving Keir Starmer
#100Days
to commit to public ownership of water.
If the new government doesn't bring water into public hands, we'll take down this failing industry and take back our water.
The countdown to the first strike wave starts today 👉
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Every water company in England and Wales is now under investigation for sewage dumping.
Every water company in England and Wales is planning to hike bills by an average of 21%.
Private ownership of water is a catastrophic failure.
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Private water trashed our waterways to make a profit for shareholders.
Now they're threatening to not invest — and clean up their mess — unless they can put prices up another £144.
We won't pay.
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Thames Water just paid out a £158 million dividend to its shareholders.
This is how private ownership of water works. Our bills rise, sewage is pumped into our rivers and shareholders still get their payday.
It's time to turn the tide 👉
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Thames Water's chief lobbyist is the former CEO of Ofwat.
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March ➡️ Thames Water pays out £158 million to shareholders while owing £16 billion.
July ➡️ Thames Water makes 37 people redundant to raise £25 million for debt repayments.
As long as water remains in private hands, it'll never be run in our interests.
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Stay out the water this bank holiday, private water companies are making profits.
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It’s time to turn the tide on 40 years of privatisation and failure.
We’re building a movement to Take Back Water.
Sign up now 👉
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🌊 "We heard that phrase used again and again to take back control, but not to have control of our water always struck me as insane."
@stephenfry
calling for public ownership of water on
#bbclaurak
this morning 👇
#TakeBackWater
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We'll take down Thames Water — and force the government to bring water back into public hands.
Today in the
@theipaper
👇
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£104 million = Ofwat's 'record' fine for illegal sewage dumping
£158 million = one payout to shareholders this year
This is just the cost of doing business for Thames Water. Easier and more lucrative for private owners to pay the fines than invest in crumbling infrastructure.
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💰 £85,000,000,000 paid out to shareholders since water was privatised.
💸 £168,000,000 in fines announced today for years of illegal sewage dumping.
Ofwat's 'record' fines are a drop in the ocean after decades of letting private owners bleed water companies dry.
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How about we... take back water.
Stephen Fry, "In the days of Brexit we heard that phrase used again and again: take back control. But not to have control of our water, always struck me, as insane"
Victoria Derbyshire, "So you're suggesting?"
Stephen Fry, "Nationalisation.. Yes.. And it may also be a good idea
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Privatisation of water has failed and all of our bills are going up.
We’re out in North London to Take Back Water.
Join our next us for our online assembly at 7pm on Monday 15th July.
✍️ Sign up at and check your email to get the Zoom link!
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So here’s the plan…
On July 5th we’re giving the new government 100 days to commit to public ownership.
We’ll use that time to build Take Back Water as a movement and prepare to call our first strike wave – if the government refuses to act.
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Starting from October 14th…
We’ll launch the first 90 days of financial disobedience, targeting the water industry by withholding our payments.
This is a low risk action and we need to take it collectively.
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Let's be clear: this is a bailout for private investors.
Water company bosses paid out billions to shareholders, loaded the industry with debt and left infrastructure to crumble – filling our rivers with raw sewage.
Now they want us to pay clean up their mess.
Average water bill set to rise by £94 over the next five years in England and Wales, regulator Ofwat says
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‼️ Water bills are rising ‼️
Ofwat, the water regulator, is set to wave through water bill hikes tomorrow — some bills could nearly double!
Water company bosses have paid out £78 billion to shareholders, pumped sewage into our rivers and now want us to pay to clean up the mess.
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🌊 It’s time to turn the tide on 40 years of privatisation and failure.
Through waves of financial disobedience, we'll build our power over the water industry — and force the government to bring it back into public hands.
Are you in? Get involved now 👉
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Thames Water bosses paid out £10.7 billion to private shareholders instead of investing in our water system.
Now their failing infrastructure is a risk to our safety and they want to hike our bills to bail them out.
We need to
#TakeBackWater
.
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Labour doesn’t want to nationalise water and is happy for water companies to charge us more for our bills after the catastrophic failure of privatisation.
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HUGE: 82% of us want public ownership of water.
Support for bringing water back into public hands has jumped a massive 23% in just seven years.
It's clear: the public is sick of the sewage dumping and total failure of privatised water.
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Levitate your expectations.
Let's
#TakeBackWater
and make sure our rivers and seas are fit for swimming again.
Sign up 👉
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Starmer's "difficult" decision is to change nothing so the profits keep flowing to private shareholders.
82% of us want water back in public hands, so at least he's right about being unpopular.
“We are going to have to be unpopular”
Prime Minister Keir Starmer says he knows his new government’s decisions are “difficult” and “unpopular” but says that they’re necessary to change the country
#BBCLauraK
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ANOTHER investor in Thames Water has written off its stake.
Private ownership has left Thames Water in such a mess — they have a captive market of 16 million customers and still investors are saying it's now worthless!
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@DefraGovUK
@SteveReedMP
As long as our water is controlled by companies they'll only ever have one priority for it. Making money. That's how companies work.
If we want water to work for us, we need to take it back into public ownership.
#TakeBackWater
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We have to force these companies out of business.
In private hands, water firms will always be incentivised to dump sewage wherever and whenever they can.
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We have to force these companies out of business and make the government take them back into public hands.
Every day water is still privately owned, this will keep happening.
A beautiful sail this morning, slightly spoiled by sailing for four miles up the Emsworth Channel through sewage, dumped by
@SouthernWater
. Four miles of sewage. That’s got to be millions of litres. Stank. Still, it won’t bother Southern Water.
@Feargal_Sharkey
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It's pretty basic that we should be able to head down to the beach or a river to have a swim and cool down in the middle of a heatwave.
But no. This has been taken away from us so water company bosses could pay out £billions to shareholders instead of maintaining infrastructure.
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We handed over 9,000 leaflets today outlining our plan to take back water and to kick our the profiteers.
Join us in making a mass movement 👇
✍️ sign up at
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We've packed up and sent out 10,000s of
#TakeBackWater
leaflets across the country.
Our next batch is going soon — order a stack here 👉
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tfw you've been swimming outdoors in britain
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Important thread.
All Thames Water is good for is paying out billions to shareholders and pumping our rivers full of shit.
Time to shut it down and bring water back into public hands.
A turd in the hand is worth… billions in profits!
As OFWAT allows massive bill rises to reward
@thameswater
’s continued failure, here’s what my experience of standing in a river full of shit has taught me about the sewage crisis, it’s origins & what we must do to fix it 🧵
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Thames Water is circling the drain.
But the government is still refusing to bring it back into public hands and end the failure of private ownership.
That means higher bills for us, more sewage dumping and more dividends.
We need to pull the plug 👉
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Thames Water says it needs customers to bail it out after decades of failed management.
We won't.
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We have joined with dozens of other organisations, unions and celebrities on calling for a root-and-branch review of water ownership.
🚨 BREAKING 🚨 An open letter has called for a review of water ownership + regulation in first 100 days.
@SteveReedMP
has a BIG opportunity here to break with past failures.
✍️ Thanks for signing
@JoeLycett
@MrNishKumar
@SASCampaigns
@RiverActionUK
@TheRiversTrust
@GreenpeaceUK
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Be grateful you can drink water from the tap.
Seriously?
👉
Brilliant news - the drinking water restriction for Bramley has been released as of 5 pm. Letters will be distributed to the impacted area overnight.
Enjoy the tap water Bramley.
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Let's go:
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"One group, Take Back Water, aims to secure support from a critical mass of people willing to withhold payment simultaneously. Every boycotter should sign up.
The time is ripe to invoke the spirit that defeated the poll tax to reverse the madness of water privatisation."
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Thames Water is circling the drain.
Time to pull the plug and bring it into public ownership 👉
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Thousands of bank holiday plans ruined because Southern Water are dumping raw sewage in the sea.
With his £183,600 bonus this year, Southern Water's boss probably bought himself a pool.
It's a sunny bank holiday Sunday and
@SouthernWater
have decided to mark the occasion by releasing enormous amounts of sewage across the south east 💩
The following locations have had sewage releases within the last 24 hours:
Sheerness
Whitstable
Herne Bay
Margate*
Broadstairs*
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We have a once in a lifetime opportunity for public ownership of water by and for the people.
With the water industry on the verge of collapse, now is the time to act 👉
If we don't, they'll raise our bills to bail themselves out 👇
Households are to face water bill increases of up to 73% to raise money to repair “crumbling infrastructure” and deal with record sewage spills ⬇️
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💰 We can’t keep paying for their profits when our money is needed for investment.
We believe water should be a common resource for all of us. It must be properly funded and run for the people, not for private profit and shareholders.
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Thames Water caught lobbying the government for a 59% price hike.
After loading it with £15 billion debt, Thames executives are going all out to make customers pay to bail them out.
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Everyone knows private ownership is a complete failure. 82% of the public wants water back in public hands.
But it's not enough — the government won't act until we force them to.
Financial disobedience is the tactic to make it happen. Join us today 👉
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Our regional group for Thames Water is getting organised 🌊
Financial analysts say Thames Water is one 'trigger event' away from collapse. Through mass financial disobedience, we can
#TakeDownThames
and bring it back into public hands.
Join the launch 👇
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10,000
#TakeBackWater
leaflets packed up and in the post this morning 💪
Order a stack here 👉
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🔥💧 Over 300 people have joined Take Back Water in just over a week and we've held our first online assembly tonight to start organising.
📍We've also sent out over 10,000 leaflets to dozens of towns & villages across England and Wales.
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Water companies rely on us paying our bills to make money. Thames Water alone takes in £2 billion every year. This is our only leverage – if we can coordinate to use it.
To do so, we need hundreds of thousands of ppl to participate whilst ensuring we can keep each other safe.
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Thames Water has been run into the ground.
The solution isn't spending billions to bail out its private owners, it's bringing it back into public hands.
Water should belong to all of us and be run in our interests, not for private profit.
#TakeBackWater
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Thames Water is circling the drain.
Britain's biggest water company is on the verge of collapse, so they're hiking bills by another £99.
We're not going to pay to bail them out. It's time to pull the plug 👉
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Private ownership of water has failed us.
Since privatisation in 1989, water company bosses have paid out £56 billion to shareholders whilst loading the industry with more than £60 billion worth of debt. Our water system is crumbling and in chaos due to massive underinvestment.
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In half that time, Thames Water plans to have handed another £2 billion to its shareholders.
There is no excuse for letting the failure of private water go on a second longer. Bring it into public ownership now.
🚨 NEW: Keir Starmer will say on Tuesday that he needs 10 years as Prime Minister to rebuild the country following the ‘rubble and ruin’ left by the Tories
[
@thetimes
]
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Private ownership of water is failing us all.
🌊 We're building a movement to turn the tide and force the government to bring water back into public hands.
Join today 👇
#TakeBackWater
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Want to see this 👇 take off?
Chip in a few pounds to help out 👉
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💬 Will, a member of Take Back Water from east London, said the planned bill rise was “a prime example of the failure of privatisation."
"Thames Water wants us to bail them out after decades of mismanagement and failure. We’re not going to."
👉
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NEW: Ofwat confirms bail out for Thames Water.
The regulator could've fined Thames Water £100s millions after breaching their licence to operate a water company.
But Thames wouldn't be able to afford a fine so they've just decided to let them off the hook instead.
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Why financial disobedience?
There’s no escaping it. Without leverage, there’s no power in the demand for public ownership.
That’s why we’ve come up with a new tactic: short-term withholding of payment to build confidence and power from below.
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82% of us support public ownership of water — but the government won't do it unless we force them to.
We've got a plan take back our water through waves of financial disobedience.
Join today 👉
There has been a substantial increase in public support for nationalising utilities and public transport in the last 7 years
% who say each should be run in the public sector
Water companies: 82% (+23 since 2017)
Railway companies: 76% (+16)
Energy companies: 71% ( +18)
Bus
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Private ownership of water is a total scam!
Number crunching: Average rise in household water bills over next five years v dividends paid out to shareholders by water companies since being privatised.
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Make this make sense.
Thames Water is in breach of its operating licence. But the regulator, Ofwat, won't impose a fine because they can't afford one.
Ofwat has failed so spectacularly they've given up even pretending to regulate.
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Thames Water was fined £104 million for illegally dumping sewage — but they've paid out double that to shareholders in the last year.
'More regulation' won't stop sewage dumping, we have to take these companies down and bring them back into public hands.
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Join a strike circle.
Before we strike, we’ll help you join a “strike circle” – a group of at least 5 people that are striking in your region – so you can support each other through the 90 days.
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💩 In 2023, raw sewage discharges doubled to 3.6 million hours.
And now they want us to clean up their mess. Over the next 5 years, water companies are planning to increase bills by up to 91% with almost 20p in every pound we pay already going to service their debts.
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🌊 We're building a movement to take back our water.
Through waves of financial disobedience, we'll turn the tide on 40 years of failure — and bring water back into public hands.
Help make it happen 👇
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Thames Water needs £10bn to keep it afloat and under the legislation all water users could foot the bill.
We won’t pay more for the failures of privatisation.
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Thames Water is on the verge of collapse — and bosses still signed off on another £150 MILLION dividend payout in March.
End the failure of privatisation now.
👉
Exclusive: The board of Thames Water agreed to pay a £150m dividend hours before its shareholders U-turned on plans to pump in emergency funding. With
@Annaisaac
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Disgusting. Southern Water fills a family with two young kids' home with sewage, offers a £500 'goodwill' payment and then says it's no longer their problem.
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Every year water is left in the control of private owners, another £2.5 billion will be handed over to shareholders.
It's money down the drain.
Every penny we pay should be going to investing in our broken water system.
It will cost £12.5 billion in the next Parliament to keep water companies under control of private shareholders.
We need workers and bill-payers to elect directors on boards, and stop paying polluters of our water.
With
@NickFerrariLBC
on the new Water Special Measures Bill.👇
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Someone's been out with stickers at Thames Water's HQ...
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Yorkshire Water 👇
£1,000,000 payout for the CEO.
500,000 hours of sewage dumped last year.
25% price hike for customers.
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We’ll launch bigger and bigger waves of financial disobedience for as long as it takes.
With companies like Thames Water on the verge of collapse, the privatised water industry is vulnerable.
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It's on.
A mass boycott of Thames Water bill payments is set to take place in October with the aim of forcing the Government to take the company back into public ownership
@k_petrakos
reports
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Thames Water's CEO got a £195,000 bonus for 3 months of work this year.
Debt-laden Thames Water has said it only has enough cash to fund its operations until May next year.
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Wanted: a new spin doctor at
@Ofwat
Criteria: must be able to make it look like they've been doing their job for the last 30 years
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Planning a swim this bank holiday?
Don't, says mum after 13 year-old falls 'violently ill' after swimming in the River Severn.
Every minute water remains in private hands, the government is prioritising payouts for shareholders over the health of kids.
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The government cares more about propping up the scam of private water than cleaning up our rivers and seas.
Activists warn of ‘extreme anger’ if ministers fail to reform water regulator
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Dump sewage, line the pockets of shareholders, pay paltry fines.
This is private ownership of water working exactly as intended.
Fines for years of pollution:
£104m for Thames Water
£47m for Yorkshire Water
£17m for Northumbrian Water.
Last dividend paid:
£195.8m for Thames Water
£62m for Yorkshire Water
£110.8m for Northumbrian Water
To them, fines are the cost of doing business. Public ownership now.
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Existing laws could be used to prosecute water executives for illegal sewage dumping. But they haven't been.
Saying we need new legislation lets these serial polluters off the hook for past crimes and gives no guarantee they'll even be enforced.
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Most people, whoever they vote for and wherever they live, agree.
Yet we know that no major party with power in Westminster will do it, unless we compel them to.
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Illegal sewage dumping isn't an accident, it's the business model.
It will only end when water isn't owned and run for private profit.
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Ofwat won't fine Thames Water over fears they don't have the cash to pay it.
This is the same Thames Water that recently paid out a £158 million dividend and handed its boss a £195,000 bonus for 3 months work.
The regulator won't act, so we have to 👉
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Water companies dumped raw sewage for 3.6 million HOURS in 2023 and the Environment Agency says they're "failing to get the basics right".
We need to bring this failing industry back into public hands, not fiddle around with performance rankings.
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The
#KingsSpeech
included plans to "strengthen the powers of the water regulator".
But under Ofwat's watch...
1⃣ Every water company is now under investigation for sewage dumping.
2⃣ Water bills are rising an average of 21%.
3⃣ £85 billion has been paid out to shareholders.
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The failure of private ownership in one headline.
Thames Water bosses just paid a £158 million dividend to shareholders, despite debts and sewage leaks rising.
We can't afford to continue with private ownership of water. It's time to
#TakeBackWater
.
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Our rivers and seas have been pumped full of sewage while water company bosses pull off a decades-long scam to extract £10s of billions.
This is small change, just the cost of doing business.
The only way to end this scandal is public ownership of water.
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@theipaper
@k_petrakos
We've got a once in a generation opportunity to bring water back into public hands.
Join us to stop the sewage dumping, the payouts to shareholders and the failure of private ownership.
👇
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Thames Water is worth about as much as the shit it pumps into our rivers.
Time to bring it into back into public hands.
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@SteveReedMP
So... we pay twice.
We paid for the £85 billion handed out to shareholders and now your plan is to wave through bill hikes so we pay another £88 billion to clean up the mess.
The only serious solution is public ownership.
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