Severn Trent Water Ltd has been ordered to pay £92,000 in fines and costs after pleading guilty yesterday to eleven counts of supplying water unfit for human consumption.
The case related to the supply of water with an objectionable appearance to consumers in Broadway, Worcestershire. The charges were brought under Section 70 of the Water Industry Act 1991.
Appearing at Coventry Magistrate’s Court in a case brought by the Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI), the firm was fined £6,000 on each of eleven counts totalling £66,000 and ordered to pay £25,950 towards prosecution costs and a £120 victim surcharge.
On 21st November 2012, Severn Trent Water started to receive reports of discoloured water with unusual tastes and odours coming from customers’ taps in the village of Broadway, Worcestershire. Despite initially assuring customers the water was safe to drink, subsequent company investigations found E. coli and Cryptosporidium bovis in the water leaving the Broadway Service reservoir (containing treated water) and at customers’ properties.
Pipework, wrongly thought to be disconnected from the live supply system had fractured, allowing surface water runoff from the surrounding area to enter the supply, including slurry from a nearby cattle holding area.
Professor Jeni Colbourne, Chief Inspector of Drinking Water, said:
“The Inspectorate brought this case because the company didn’t listen to consumers and put their health at risk as a consequence of systemic failings in its approach to safeguarding tap water quality.”
The Inspectorate investigates all drinking water quality events in England and Wales and will bring prosecutions if it believes that it has reliable evidence that an offence was committed, where the company does not have a defence that it took all reasonable steps and exercised all due diligence, and when such a prosecution is regarded as being in the public interest.
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