Our water bills will increase because water companies have been letting down their customers and will have to invest billions of pounds in improving the systems.

Last week the House of Lords reported that stopping the dumping of sewage into rivers and the sea will require £56 billion additional money from water bills.

Raw sewage discharge through storm overflows is meant to be an emergency last resort but it’s happening every time it rains.

The report states that ‘regulatory deterrents such as penalties and fines have been insufficient to ensure an acceptable level of performance by water companies, particularly in relation to the environment, where performance is at its lowest ever levels.’

The private water companies have been responsible for the quality of our water systems since 1989 and have not invested enough in the systems but have taken over £70 billion in payments to shareholders.

One of the conditions of the licences given to the water companies is that they must not take dividends if they are going to negatively impact on the ability of the company to do what it is paid for.

As the Lords Report says ‘It is clear that in the past, a number of water companies have been overly focused on maximising financial returns, including by increasing debt levels, at the expense of operational performance and protecting the environment.’

Thames Water are our local water company and our waste water goes to the Wantage Sewage Treatment Works (just north of Grove).

This discharges raw sewage as storm overflow into the Letcombe Brook and has done so on numerous occasions including last week when it rained.

Thames Water has set up a website https://www.thameswater.co.uk/edm-map which shows all of the treatment works and when storm overflows take place, so you can see when this happens.

You can complain about these outflows to Thames Water by emailing customer.feedback@thameswater.co.uk or writing to Thames Water at PO Box 436, Swindon, SN38 1TU. Please copy your complaint to the Environment Agency enquiries@environment-agency.gov.uk or PO Box 544, Rotherham, S60 1BY.

Every time a new major planning application is submitted, Thames Water say that the foul water infrastructure is inadequate to cope with the additional housing.

Yet Thames Waters draft drainage and foul water plans don’t mention the Wantage Treatment Works as requiring modernisation and upgrading to remedy these problems. This is despite several protected species and habitats being in the path of the Letcombe Brook outflow.