40m redress package to be reinvested in local environmental projects by Yorkshire Water

Ofwat has today (20 March) announced that it has concluded the outcome of its investigation into Yorkshire Water’s wastewater treatment works and networks and detailed a £40m redress package, which will be invested in Yorkshire. 

The £40m package, which has been reduced from the £47m proposed penalty announced by Ofwat in August 2024, will not be paid for by customers, but paid by Yorkshire Water and its shareholders.  

The total package includes:  

• £36.6m to be invested between 2025-30 to reduce discharges from storm overflows across Yorkshire. This is in addition to the £1.5bn investment Yorkshire Water will be making in storm overflows in the next five years.  
• £3.4m of support to the Great Yorkshire Rivers Partnership to enable it to go beyond its target for the next five years of clearing artificial barriers in Yorkshire’s rivers, which will improve water quality and biodiversity in the area and reconnect up to 500km of rivers. 
• Committing to an action plan to ensure all Yorkshire Water storm overflows are compliant with legal requirements.  

Nicola Shaw, Chief Executive of Yorkshire Water, commented: “We know our storm overflows operate more frequently than we, or our customers, would like them to. Since 2021, we’ve been actively taking steps to improve our performance. We began remedying all the issues that had been identified, during Ofwat’s investigation, at our wastewater treatment works, and then took the additional decision to start our £180m investment programme to reduce discharges further. We’ve now completed work at 70 storm overflows and we’re about to start our £1.5bn programme to reduce discharges even further over the next five years. 

“We know there’s still more for us to do. We’re at the forefront of the industry to get this resolved and we’re looking forward to delivering our ambitious plans to improve river health in Yorkshire. We apologise for our past mistakes and hope this redress package goes some way to show our commitment to improving the environment. The overflows we’ll be investing in will be ones that were due to receive investment in the 2030-35 period and we’ll be accelerating improvements to them. We are pleased that Ofwat understands the importance of this money staying within our region to help fund vital environmental improvements that will have real benefits for the customers of Yorkshire.”  

A spokesperson on behalf of The Great Yorkshire Rivers Partnership said: “We welcome the additional funding that supports the vision of our Partnership that aims to deliver real change within the Yorkshire landscape. Our mission is to address all significant barriers to fish migration in Yorkshire’s rivers.  This helps nature restore natural river processes, improve water quality and promote biodiversity to create better blue spaces for both nature and people. By reinvesting this money in Yorkshire, even more projects will be delivered by Great Yorkshire Rivers partners across the county to support the recovery of our native fish species.”