Severn Trent Water deny winter supply problem claims

The GMB union had demanded that regulator Ofwat investigate the reasons behind an increase in Severn Trent's estimates of background consumption among customers.

The union, which represents water workers, had claimed that the increase was masking a rise in leaks on the water network, caused by a restructuring of the business that saw it shed 500 staff earlier this year.

But Severn Trent vehemently denied the claims, and said its water levels were in a healthy state ahead of the winter period.

"The restructuring of the business earlier this year didn't reduce the number of front line staff and so far this year we've had more teams than ever working to find and fix leaks across the region," company spokesman Rebecca Murphy said.

"Over the last five years we've seen a 10 per cent decrease in our leakage levels and our focus going forwards is to bring that level down even further and to fix as many leaks as possible within 24 hours."

She added: "Leakage is one of a number of performance measures we report on an annual basis to Ofwat and our performance is published on our website. Prior to publication our leakage performance is subjected to rigorous assurance processes performed by a recognised external body.

"Overall our water resources are in a healthy position for this time of year and we don't anticipate any supply problems over the winter."

GMB had called on Ofwat to investigate why during the past year the allowance for background consumption of water had increased from two to 2.4 litres per property per hour.

This change over the 4.3 million properties served by Severn Trent Water adds up to more than 40 million litres per day.

Gary Smith, GMB national secretary for utilities, said: "There are concerns that as far back as January senior management within STW could see they were going to fail the leakage target largely due to grossly failed change plans which reduced 500 key operational roles at a critical time. GMB want Ofwat to investigate whether managers then began to seek to manipulate backgound usage allowances and for this to be set against that otherwise attributed to be leakage."