Tag archives for Southern Water
Water Mess
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The Environment Agency (EA) has published its first comprehensive assessment of England’s rivers, lakes and coastal waters in six years. The findings reveal that only 15% of the…
Tested by the Waters
Sea-swimmer, dog-owner, and relative newcomer INGRID ALLAN dips her toe in the waters around Hastings TOBY COLLINS With the recent Blue Flag and Seaside Award given to Marina and Pelham…
Fraud Charges to Proceed against ex-Southern Water Staff
JAMES ARNOLD-HO Former Southern Water boss Matthew Wright and three other former employees are facing prosecution over allegations that they manipulated wastewater test results. A High Court ruling on 22…
Water Bill Boycott
KENT BARKER A campaign is growing for Hastings residents to join a boycott of payments to Southern Water. Organisations like Boycott Water Bills, Don’t Pay for Dirty Water and Extinction…
Shingle All the Way
PAUL McLAUGHLIN People walking along the Hastings seafront in recent weeks will have noticed the massive buildup of shingle gathered up by the Harbour Arm in front of the RNLI…
Free Help withRising Water Bills
With water bills rising yet again from 1 April, local community benefit society Energise Sussex Coast (ESC) is urging anyone in East Sussex who is struggling with their water bills…
Sea Swimmers Talking Sewage
FIONA MCGARRY Reports indicate that 2026 is on track for high volumes of sewage spills, with 3,899 alerts already issued by late March, over double the same period in 2025.…
GOLF: Beauport Park to Lose Pitch and Putt
The Beauport Park Golf & Country Club is about to lose its nine-hole pitch-and-putt course, currently on land leased from the adjacent Bannatyne Spa Hotel. The hotel’s owners now require…
Reputational Water Damage
KENT BARKER considers what Southern Water can do to improve its image - and its services - in 2026. 2025 was a pretty bad year for Southern Water and its…
Nurturing Nature?
PHILIPPA BOGLE says the devastating release of plastic pellets by Southern Water at the end of 2025 has focused attention on another East Sussex beauty spot which is threatened by…
Volunteers Praised in Plastic Pollution Cleanup
KENT BARKER and JAMES PRENTICE The scores of volunteers who helped tackle ‘catastrophic’ pollution at Camber Sands have been praised by a government minister. The clean-up operation got underway after…
Bio-Bead Clean Up Could Take Years
Pollution from millions of plastic ‘bio-beads’ released by Southern Water’s Eastbourne treatment plant could take years to clean up, a public meeting in Rye heard this week. MP Helena Dollimore…
Swimmers Warned off Beaches Following Heavy Rain
The Environment Agency (EA) advised members of the public not to swim off any of the beaches at Hastings, St Leonards or Bexhill last week following the heavy rainfall over…
Southern Water Condemned For CEO Pay Rise
The new pay package of £ million for the Chief Executive of Southern Water - almost double his previous salary – has been strongly criticised by Hastings MP Helena Dollimore.…
New Water Outage Across Ore
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Some 300 households have been affected by new water outages across Ore. Local residents have been reporting erratic water supply and low pressure since mid-April, with many households…
Water Compensation Victory
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Southern Water has agreed to pay £ million in compensation to its customers in Hastings who were left without water for several days last May. The incident, which…
Water Compensation Reviewed
PAUL McLAUGHLIN In a bruising exchange with local Labour MP Helena Dollimore in Parliament, the CEO of Southern Water, Lawrence Gosden, pledged to review the decision not to pay compensation to…
Southern Water Plans for Hastings Evoke Sceptical Response
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN In the week when Southern Water unveiled “ambitious, multi-million pound investment plans” to upgrade water infrastructure and quality across Hastings, Moody’s, the global rating agency, downgraded the privatised…
Goodwill in Short Supply
Southern Water held another of its drop-in events at the Stade Hall last Thursday (5 September) to reassure local people about the ongoing works in the Hastings area to improve…
Burst Pipe Replacement ‘Wasn’t Necessary’
HUGH SULLIVAN HIP recently reported that in 2007 Southern Water obtained planning permission from Rother District Council to replace the mains supply pipeline on the basis that it was “outworn”.…
Southern Water – Another Day, Another Mess
KATE SHAW There is real public outrage about the sewage pollution in our seas and rivers. Last Saturday (18 May) communities around the UK came together in a national day…
Flood Report Blames Rain, Tide…
and Southern Water HUGH SULLIVAN A report commissioned by East Sussex County Council into the flooding of Hastings Town Centre in October last year has been delivered by consulting engineers…
Not a Drop to Drink
Southern Water Faces Fresh Barrage of Complaint HUGH SULLIVAN Around 32,500 households across the majority of Hastings, St Leonards and Westfield were left without water for most of the bank…
Water Bill Boycott: Town Hall Event
There is something about the impunity with which England’s water companies are allowed to dump sewage into our rivers and seas: it seems emblematic of the corruption and gross inequality…
Clean Water Watch
A regular column to update readers on the damaging effects of the current management of water in Hastings, surrounding areas (and nationally) and what people are doing about it. If…
Council Anger: “They Have Trashed our Town”
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Trust in Southern Water amongst Hastings Borough Councillors has plunged to a new low in the wake of last month’s town centre flooding. At a simmering meeting of…
WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND?
Letter Drainage History Dear HIP Picking up on Martin Griffiths’ letter regarding the town centre flooding (HIP 239), I think we all need to be told of the usefulness or…
One Woman, Four Floods, No Justice
HELEN MURPHY & NICK PELLING investigate one woman’s struggle with Southern Water In the last edition of HIP (238), much was written about the seeming incompetence of Southern Water and…
Clean Water Watch
A regular column to update readers on the damaging effects of the current management of water in Hastings, surrounding areas (and nationally) and what people are doing about it. If…
Water Woes
BEN BRUGES castigates the woeful record of Southern Water and wonders whether the company should be abolished. Recently Southern Water, for the second time, smeared excrement all over Bulverhythe and…
WATER ,WATER, EVERYWHERE
PAUL McLAUGHLIN and HUGH SULLIVAN Hastings town centre, Alexandra Park and areas in between were again under water last weekend following another sustained period of heavy rainfall – around two…
Privatisation of Water Was a “Mistake” Says Local MP
Paul McLaughlin Local MP Sally-Ann Hart expressed her “deep frustration” at the poor performance of Southern Water and now believes water privatisation was a “mistake… in hindsight.” In a wide-ranging…
Clean Water Watch
A regular column to update readers on the damaging effects of our current management of water in Hastings and the surrounding area and what people are doing to improve the…
Sewage Leak: Pump Up the Volume
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The Pumphouse in Alexandra Park was packed last week (14 July) for a meeting to discuss the recent sewage pollution of the Old Roar Gill. There was a…
WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND?
We would love to hear from write to: Please be aware we may need to edit letters for reasons of space and we will only withhold names if this is…
Boycotts and Renationalisation – the Future of Water Companies?
FELICITY LAURENCE With national news focussing on the recent revelations about Thames Water’s likely collapse – and the huge profits they have been raking in for so long – people…
Southern Water– Bad to Worse
PAUL McLAUGHLIN It has been yet another bad fortnight for Southern Water. After being roundly criticised (see HIP 228) over its failure to provide crucial data to an independent inquiry…
Southern Water rebuked again
Investigators of town centre floods demand further data PAUL McLAUGHLIN Southern Water has been roundly criticised once again – this time over its failure to provide crucial data to an…
Has Southern Water dumped its last load?
LUCY BROWN We’ve burnt effigies, we’ve protested, filmed illegal dumping – yes pun intended – even sought legal advice against bill paying, yet Southern Water plough on pumping raw sewage…
We Won’t Pay for Environmental Vandalism
KATY WEITZ They are the new refuseniks: individuals who have stopped paying private water companies for ‘wastewater services’ in protest at persistent sewage spills. They argue that while the water…