Water firms ‘syphon £6.5bn to foreign investors in 5yrs’
FOREIGN hedge funds, governments and offshore businesses are soaking up profits from hard-up water customers.
More than 70% of our water industry is owned from abroad with dividends of £6.5billion paid out in the past five years, reveals research by the GMB Union.
This fuelled calls for re-nationalisation, with 6,000 people having signed a Take Back the Tap petition. The union is urging Environment Secretary Michael Gove to act. GMB’s Tim Roache said: “It’s a scandal that the supply of water that falls from England’s skies is overwhelmingly owned by overseas profiteers.” Cheung Kong Group, registered in the Cayman Islands, owns 80% of Northumbrian Water while a third of Thames Water is owned by firms in the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, China and Australia.