Steve Reed

Steve Reed

Labour (Co-op) — Streatham and Croydon North

Speaking in the House of Commons on 16 December 2024

Debate

Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords]

Contribution

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. One of the reasons the Government commissioned a review into governance and regulation is because of the failure of the current system that the previous Government allowed to continue. I share customers’ anger about the scale of water bill rises they seem likely to face. They are rightly furious at being left to pay the price of Conservative failure. I am grateful that the party opposite has indicated support for the Bill. It is just a shame its support has come so late. In December last year, while they were still in government, I called a vote on introducing a ban on unjustified bonuses for water bosses, but they refused to do it. They could have acted at any point over the past 14 years, but they would not do it. There have been many times in history when Labour has had to clean up the Tories’ mess, but rarely quite so literally as cleaning up the raw sewage polluting our country’s waterways.

More from Steve Reed

Other recent Hansard contributions by the same speaker.

About Hansard

Hansard is the official verbatim record of proceedings in the UK Parliament. Every word spoken in the Commons and Lords is recorded and published — this page is a single contribution from that record.

For Steve Reed's full parliamentary record including voting history, expenses and all other contributions, see the Steve Reed report card.