Speeches by Dollimore.

“Why have the lessons not been learned? In October 2023, in Rye, I fed the lessons directly into Southern Water. I then saw the same failures played out in Hastings, and we have heard about exactly the same happening in Southampton. Why does your company not learn the lessons each time?”

“What about the response when they did happen?”

“You would agree that Southern Water’s response to those three incidents was unacceptable.”

“I need to start by declaring an interest as a customer in Hastings—I lost my supply for five days last May—and as co-chair of the all-party group on water pollution. Lawrence, your company has the worst record of any water company when it comes to water outages, with customers losing their supply sometimes for many day…”

“Would you like to see a different structure and model of ownership in the industry?”

“Do you accept that there is a problem with the structure of the water industry?”

“David, you represent the water industry. Your evidence today suggests that you are somewhat struggling to read the room in terms of the level of anger out there in our constituencies at how water companies have behaved in polluting our seas and failing in their basic services. You have blamed lots of other people for t…”

“Is it your belief that that should be the case, and that all incidents should be covered?”

“David, on your response to the GSS update, with the figures going up and the number of incidents that will be covered going up, you mentioned that, when these changes are made, compensation will be payable in incidents where the interruption lasts 12 hours or more. Is it your understanding that that covers both an outa…”

“Why have the lessons not been learned? In October 2023, in Rye, I fed the lessons directly into Southern Water. I then saw the same failures played out in Hastings, and we have heard about exactly the same happening in Southampton. Why does your company not learn the lessons each time?”

“What about the response when they did happen?”

“You would agree that Southern Water’s response to those three incidents was unacceptable.”

“I need to start by declaring an interest as a customer in Hastings—I lost my supply for five days last May—and as co-chair of the all-party group on water pollution. Lawrence, your company has the worst record of any water company when it comes to water outages, with customers losing their supply sometimes for many day…”

“Would you like to see a different structure and model of ownership in the industry?”

“Do you accept that there is a problem with the structure of the water industry?”

“David, you represent the water industry. Your evidence today suggests that you are somewhat struggling to read the room in terms of the level of anger out there in our constituencies at how water companies have behaved in polluting our seas and failing in their basic services. You have blamed lots of other people for t…”

“Is it your belief that that should be the case, and that all incidents should be covered?”

“That was a pipe you were aware of.”

“That was a pipe you were aware of.”

“Would the incident in Rye have been one like that?”