Emma Hardy MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  The hon. Lady raises a shocking and awful case, and I am more than happy to meet her and look into it. There is no excuse for sewage ending up in primary schools or floating down the street. I am happy to take that up.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  This point came up repeatedly during the passage of the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025 and, fundamentally, my response remains the same, which is that the cost and time spent on installing monitors could be more effectively spent and used to prevent this from happening in the first place. That is why we want to focus on delivering the storm overflow reduction plan, which is looking to deliver £60 billion of investment across England by 2050 to reduce the number of overflows. Rather than trying to measure the problem, we are trying to tackle it.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for his question, but I think it is a misrepresentation—I am sure it was an accident—to say that the Government are doing any kind of deals. The Government are working closely with Ofwat, which is evaluating the consortium’s proposals. Of course, the Government will always have the best interests of customers and the environment at heart. As I have said many times in the House, we stand ready for all eventualities, including applying for special administration if necessary.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Lady raises an important point, and that lake sounds very beautiful. Conversations are ongoing with the new devolved Government. She knows that the UK Government support devolution wherever we can. The new Welsh Government have only recently been elected, but I assure her that conversations are happening right now about how we will set things up so that Wales will have a separate regulator from England.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  As summer comes, we all want to be enjoying our beaches, going for a swim, having a paddle and not having to think about checking an app to see whether they are polluted. My hon. Friend and his constituents are right to feel angry about the current situation. We have told companies that in delivering their storm overflow reduction plan, they must prioritise bathing waters and chalk streams to begin with so that we can make those as safe as possible. Our reforms to bathing waters will help clean them up more quickly, because we want everybody to go out and enjoy the great British seaside this summer.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for the passion with which she speaks about this issue. I reiterate that my focus has always been on the quickest and most effective way I can deal with some of the problems in front of me. There are questions over how much nationalisation would cost—we have heard them before—and we know that the water companies have £82.7 billion of outstanding debt. It is always difficult—again, this probably goes beyond my role and into that of the Treasury—to decide on priorities about what we spend money on, but that is not for one moment to give the impression that I am happy with the status quo or that I think the current situation is good, because I simply do not. It is about how we make the most effective change in the quickest way, which is why having set out in the White Paper a transparent process to look at not-for-profit mutuals and other different models is so important.

• 8 Jun 2026 · Water Companies · Hansard source

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  That was a record fine for not delivering safe and clean drinking water, but the hon. Gentleman is right that what happened there is a serious issue. Issuing fines is a matter for the independent regulators. On making the polluter pay, through our changes to the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025 we can recoup the cost of investigation from the company, and we can carry out more investigations, so under this Government the polluter really does pay.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The answer is a huge amount. The EA has carried out over 10,000 inspections of water company sites in 2025-26, compared with the 4,000 before Labour came to power, and we have provided a record £189 million to fund hundreds of enforcement officers, because this Government are actually taking action on this issue.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. May I take this opportunity to apologise to the right hon. Gentleman for the lack of response? I will follow it up immediately with the Department. I am happy to meet him personally and will ensure that this happens within the next couple of weeks. I am sorry for the lack of response, which is not acceptable. We will make changes to put it right.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Lady for her question and for her excitement at having the first ever bathing water designation in the city of London. There will obviously be extremely high standards when it comes to any waste water that comes from any treatment plant. One thing we are doing through the White Paper—in fact, I met Sir Chris Whitty yesterday—is to look really seriously at public health and waste water, and what we can do to ensure the highest possible standards so that it is safe for people to enjoy all designated bathing areas.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I am really proud that our country has world-leading drinking water quality—in fact, our PFAS standard of 0.1 micrograms per litre is among the tightest in the whole world. I completely accept the “polluter pays” principle, although that is quite challenging for PFAS, because much of it is historical contamination. We are now working through that to make the principle work effectively in practice, while acknowledging that it is sometimes very difficult to identify the original source of PFAS.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Clean Waterways: Thames Valley · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman raises an important point; I would be happy to look at it with the Environment Agency.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Clean Waterways: Thames Valley · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for bringing this important issue to the House, and I join him in paying tribute to the Environment Agency, all the emergency responders and everybody who has been working so hard. Public health advice has been issued, including precautionary guidance to avoid contact with potentially contaminated material. The incident is under investigation to assess regulatory compliance and to determine whether enforcement action is required, and I am happy to meet him to see whether it has been dealt with to his satisfaction and whether there is any more help I can give him.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Clean Waterways: Thames Valley · Hansard source

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  We are taking decisive action to clean up waterways in the Thames valley, tackling pollution from water companies, agriculture and urban run-off. The Environment Agency carried out more than 800 inspections of Thames Water assets this year, holding water companies to account and improving water quality for local communities.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Water Quality · Hansard source

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  It would be difficult to identify whose product it was in the water, but I am sure that is not quite what my hon. Friend meant. I wholeheartedly agree with him on the issue of making water bosses clean up the mess that has been created. That is why we passed the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025, which introduced tough accountability measures that sadly have been lacking for the last decade.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Water Quality · Hansard source

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  I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman’s expertise in this area. This is a serious issue; a scientific group is looking at it and will give advice to Ministers on what is the best course of action to take.

• 4 Jun 2026 · Water Quality · Hansard source

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  The Government are serious about holding water companies to account and maintaining high drinking water standards. Just this week, South West Water has rightly been fined £1.85 million—a record fine for a drinking water offence—for failures that led to a cryptosporidium outbreak in the Brixham area of Devon. We will keep taking action so that communities can have safe, clean and reliable drinking water.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  I totally agree with my hon. Friend. As I have mentioned before, I do not have an issue with bonuses per se; I just think they should be linked to how well people do their jobs. We have banned unfair bonuses through the Water (Special Measures) Act, but some companies have attempted to exploit loopholes so that they can continue to award them. We are determined to close those loopholes.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  One of the first things we did when we came into government was to look at the guaranteed standards scheme. We have introduced increased compensation payments and new standards. Previously, compensation was not being paid when people were under a boil notice, but this Government have introduced that, along with doubling compensation for failings such as supply interruptions, low pressure and sewer flooding. Because of those changes, customers should for the first time be receiving payments for boil notices. We have told water companies to make compensation available to people as soon as possible. We are clear that customers come first. They are the people I care about, and they are the people for whom I am the Water Minister. We will also look at introducing a water ombudsman. In the conversation I had with South East Water on Sunday, I asked it to identify by the end of the week what compensation will be paid to who, and when, and I will be following up on that.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right. It is astonishing that although, owing to climate change, we will experience wetter and wetter winters and drier and drier summers, we have no capacity to store water in the winter and use it in the summer. That seems to me to be absolute nonsense. As for the issue of data centres, there is one possibility that I am keen to look into, and I touched on it in an earlier answer. Under the current legislation, water that is supplied by a water company must be of drinking-water standard. It strikes me as logical and sensible to say, “If water is being used for cooling purposes rather than for drinking purposes in people’s homes, could it not be of a different standard? Why does it need to be of drinking-water quality?” Where, for instance, we want to use water for data centres, for growth, why do we not—in a closed-loop system—use waste water? We have some legislation that has been drafted for the right purposes and sounds great—of course, a water company must produce water of drinking-water standard—but does it need to be of drinking-water standard if it is being used to cool machinery?

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman is right to point out the consequences of getting it wrong. Just to reassure him, we are looking at using tools such as the water delivery taskforce where we have shortages, to see what we can do. That is for not just water, but waste water capacity too, because both are crucial. We want to see homes being built—people want somewhere to live, and first-time buyers in particular are finding it incredibly difficult—but we are taking a sensible approach. We are identifying where we have shortages in waste water or water to see what we can do to address the amount available, as well as what can be done to reduce demand in that area, including retrofitting, building standards and various other measures.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  The short answer is yes. The previous chief executive of South East Water—or rather the current chief executive, who has not gone yet—met members of the water delivery taskforce a few weeks ago, with some of the councillors from the area, to discuss exactly that issue of how both water supply and housing demands can be met. I sit on the taskforce along with representatives of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, so we are all having the conversation together about how we build the homes that are needed without having an impact on the people already living in the area, yet also ensuring that new homes have the water that they require. We have been assessing what is likely to happen over the next five, 10 or 15 years. What are the various water supplies that will be coming in? What impact will that have on house building? How can homes be built to a more water-efficient design? Those conversations are happening now, across Government. We need to achieve the right balance between ensuring that everyone has a home to live in and, at the same time, preventing a water crisis?

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  I know how passionately my hon. Friend cares about this issue, and I genuinely pay tribute to him for championing this issue and for the work he has done in Parliament to bring people together. As I have mentioned, the White Paper talks about setting up a transparent process to look at whether a company should transition to a different model, including a not-for-profit, if that was what it wished to do.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  As I have highlighted, the White Paper talks about companies that wish to move to alternative ownership models, but I will briefly touch on special administration for breaching statutory duties. Under section 37 of the Water Industry Act 1991, a water company has a duty to supply water within its area of appointment. A serious breach of these principal duties or of an enforcement order can be grounds for a performance special administration regime, if that breach is so serious that it is no longer appropriate for the company to continue to hold its instrument of appointment.

• 3 Jun 2026 · South East Water: Disruption of Supply · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Lady for her work on the EFRA Committee. She is entirely right: it is unacceptable. I feel that I am a fair-minded person. I know that water companies cannot control the weather, and I know that they cannot build a reservoir overnight. However, they certainly can contact their Members of Parliament, contact their councils, get in touch with their local resilience forums and make sure that they communicate with their customers, as an absolute bare minimum, and that is exactly the conversation that I will be having with each and every one of them.