Bonus banned over sewage. Salary rises 14%. Water finds a way
The government banned water company bonuses for serious pollution. Wessex Water, expecting to fall foul of the ban 'particularly in relation to environmental and operational metrics' — savour that phrasing — raised its chief executive's base salary 14% instead, to £670,000, total package £791,000. The workers got 3.5%. The sewage got the rivers.
Elsewhere in the sector, Anglian Water routed £500,000 to its CEO via the parent company, calling it a retention payment, permitted because it is not linked to performance. Nothing in the sector is linked to performance. That has always been the point.
The union man said the bosses 'keep finding ways to sneak past the legislation'. They do. They always will. Legislation is a fence; money is water; water finds the gap. It's the one flow they never fail to manage.
Bills, meanwhile, rise 21% over five years to pay for the infrastructure that the decades of dividends did not build. The regulator promises disclosure rules. Disclosure: the punishment of being seen, applied to those beyond embarrassment. The rivers accept their annual instalment. As expected.