Northumbrian Water Group has been recognised by the Ethisphere Institute as a 2014 World’s Most Ethical Company® - the only water company in the world and the only UK-based utility company to be awarded the honour this year.

This is the fourth time that Northumbrian Water Group has been honoured with this award, which recognises organisations that continue to raise the bar on ethical leadership and corporate behaviour.

Heidi Mottram, Chief Executive Officer of Northumbrian Water Group, said:

“I am delighted that we have been added to the Ethisphere Institute′s World’s Most Ethical Companies list for the fourth year running. We are the only water company in the world to be awarded this title and also the only UK-based utility company.”

“Recognition such as this demonstrates that Northumbrian Water Group is leading the way in the water industry and founded on a strong belief to serve our communities and the environment in which they live.”

Ethisphere’s Chief Executive Officer, Timothy Erblich, said:

“The entire community of World’s Most Ethical Companies believe that customers, employees, investors and regulators place a high premium on trust and that ethics and good governance are key in earning it. Northumbrian Water Group joins an exclusive community committed to driving performance through leading business practices. We congratulate everyone at Northumbrian Water Group for this extraordinary achievement.”

The World′s Most Ethical Company assessment is based upon the Ethisphere Institute’s Ethics Quotient™ framework. The Ethics Quotient framework has been developed over years of effort to provide a means to assess an organisation’s performance in an objective, consistent and standardised way.

The information collected provides a comprehensive sampling of definitive criteria of core competencies, rather than all aspects of corporate governance, risk, sustainability, compliance and ethics.

Scores are generated in five key categories: ethics and compliance program (25%), reputation, leadership and innovation (20%), governance (10%), corporate citizenship and responsibility (25%) and culture of ethics (20%).

The Ethisphere® Institute is an independent centre of research, best practices and thought leadership that promotes best practices in corporate ethics and governance and enables organizations to improve compliance, mitigate risk, and enhance relationships with employees, business partners, investors and the broad regulatory community.