Every morning, Jo Bateman checks her phone to see if the sea is closed.

Good Law Project 

Swimming in Exmouth has been vital for Jo’s mental health and wellbeing. But South West Water has shattered that routine by dumping raw sewage where she swims.

Last year the firm poured sewage out on to the beach in Exmouth 217 times, for a total duration of 2,156 hours, keeping Jo out of the water for days at a time. And there have been more than 100 dumps so far this year, with 1,115 hours of spills from January to March.

Jo says the sewage South West Water continues to dump into our waters is “disgusting:”

“It pollutes our beaches, harms nature, makes people sick – and takes away our right to swim.”

That’s why we’re backing Jo as she takes on South West Water – a company that unleashed a tide of sewage on her beach. After our Supreme Court win, she’s broadening her challenge to cover 300 days when swimming was impossible in Exmouth.

She’s fighting for transformational change – and she’s not backing down.

Best wishes,

Katrina, Good Law Project

Good Law Project only exists thanks to donations from people like you.If you would like to support us further, you can make a donation here:

Our latest Water Quality Report reveals that sewage is being dumped into our rivers and seas on a scale that defies belief—and the people who should be stopping it are cashing in instead.

Surfers Against Sewage Quality Report 2025 www.sas.org.uk (Extract)

[See separate post on how “industry leader”, South West Water, was rewarded £6.7m for failure.]

While private water companies handed £1.2 billion to shareholders, they also dumped 4.7 million hours of sewage into our waterways in 2024. That’s 592,478 spills in just one year.

At the same time, water bills are rising, targets are being missed, and public trust is circling the drain. Over a quarter of adults in England are so fed up, they’ve considered not paying their water bills.

Our latest Water Quality Report lays it all bare. Read the report

Water companies are failing

Our report reveals broken promises and missed pollution targets. Billions for shareholders, while customers pay more for less. Public health at risk, with zero accountability. And a total lack of transparency from those in charge.

England

In 2024, water companies in England recorded 2,487 pollution incidents—more than double the target set by the Environment Agency. This marks the highest number in a decade, despite promises to clean up their act.

The water industry was meant to reduce pollution by 40%. Instead? We’ve seen a 30% increase.

…….Results for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland omitted in this extract……

People are getting sick

Our Safer Seas & Rivers Service App received 1,853 illness reports from water users in 2024 alone—that’s five people a day getting sick after entering polluted water.

• 331 people saw a doctor
• 79% were told their illness was caused by sewage
• From gastro bugs to chest infections, even hospitalisations and heart surgery—the human cost is staggering.

Real people. Real impacts.

• Suzi, a sea swimmer from Bognor Regis, ended up in critical care and needed open-heart surgery after falling seriously ill.
• Charlie, an Ironman athlete, was left isolated and unable to train for months after collapsing from a virus caught while swimming.
• Shelley, a carer from Scotland, was hospitalised for 5 days after contracting a diarrheal disease from contaminated water, impacting her ability to care for her son.
• Martyn, a swimmer from Pembrokeshire, had his eye swell and close up after swimming at his local beach. He needed painkillers and antibiotics and was left unable to work or drive.
• Ben is the director and head coach at Surfability in Swansea, which runs adaptive surf sessions for people with additional needs. He’s been forced to cancel many surf lessons due to poor water quality, reducing access to the healing power of the water for many people.

These stories are just a few of thousands. Read more shocking stories in the report.

See more stories

We’re calling for radical reform

We simply cannot trust the UK’s water industry in its current state. Our Water Quality Report calls for urgent and transformational reform of the privatised water industry. It’s time to:

✅ Put people and planet before profit

✅ Give local voices a say in how water is managed

✅ Enforce the law—no more pollution without consequence

✅ End profit from pollution—once and for all

NOW is our opportunity for real change. The Independent Commission will be finalising its recommendations for water industry reform in England and Wales in May. This is our chance to be heard.

“Industry Leader” South West Water received a financial reward worth £6.7 million in 2019 for the promises it made to improve our water quality over the following five years. Ha, ha!

But SWW  is on track to FAIL by a wide margin

Owl thought that SWW was an “Industry Leader” in pollution but it seems, in this context, it means Industry leader in creative writing of future plans.

Now, in 2025, we are starting a new five year review period, similar promises are being made and Ofwat has again dished out a reward for SWW’s next set of plans.This time it’s worth an equivalent to £36 million. 

“The stench of the sewage scandal has become a fixture of the mainstream news in the last few years, with water companies making promise after promise to deliver record investments and hit all kinds of glittering targets. But can we ever truly believe them?” 

Extracted from Surfers Against Sewage Water Quality Report 2025 with a few additional headings for clarity.

The report continues:

Promises, promises – Price Review Plans

“Water companies in England and Wales are regulated by multiple bodies, including Ofwat, which oversees their finances and operations. Every five years, each company has to submit investment plans to Ofwat through a process called the price review (PR).

PR plans show us what each water company is promising to deliver, the level of investment needed; and how much customers will have to pay in bills over the course of the five years the PR plan runs for. 

In a functional system, that makes total sense. But in a broken industry, you learn not to trust companies to deliver on their promises. Or the regulator to hold them accountable. 

Forget the old unmet promises – look on the bright side and welcome the new

Why are the new proposals welcomed into the room so warmly, when all the unmet promises from the previous plan are still sat there in plain sight?

In 2025, PR19 ended, and PR24 began. We took the opportunity to examine the past five years of PR19 (2020-2025), to see whether water companies got anywhere near achieving what they’d pledged. 

Assessing the “industry leaders” 

In its initial assessment of PR19 plans, Ofwat identified three companies that stood out: South West Water, Severn Trent and United Utilities. 

According to the regulator, this trio offered ambitious plans that set a new standard for the water sector. So, it awarded them fast-track status. In exchange for promising to trailblaze on positive outcomes for both customers and the environment, these companies were heralded as industry leaders; given a head start on other companies to get working on their big plans, and millions in financial rewards.11 But what standard were they really setting for the industry?

South West Water (SWW) received a financial reward worth £6.7 million for its 2019 plans. 

Part of this reward was allocated because SWW promised to deliver on its proposed sector leading outcomes, like improving its environmental ratings and reducing sewer blockages. 

SWW pledged to reduce pollution incidents to 19.5 incidents13 per 10,000 km of sewers by 2024-25. 

So far, it’s failed miserably. In fact, between 2022 and 2023, pollution incidents on its patch shot up by 80%. 

We can’t access official data on pollution incident reports until July 2025, but we have received unverified data from the Environment Agency through a Freedom of Information request. 

This data shows that there were 188 pollution incidents in 2024.

Assuming the length of the sewer network remained the same as the year before, this equates to 107.8 pollution incidents per 10,000 km of pipe. While this number may change once the final figures are released, our investigation suggests that South West Water is on track to fail its target – with five times more pollution incidents than they were aiming for. 

However we’ve been digging into SWW’s performance when it comes to sewage pollution over the last five years and they do not look like a water company performing exceptionally.

In April 2022, SWW’s Plan for Healthy Rivers and Seas14 contained a pledge to cut storm overflow discharges to an average of 20 per year by 2025. In 2024 their average discharges per overflow was 41.3, which is more than double the target. And 2025 isn’t looking much better. According to our live reporting data from Data HQ, 21% of SWW overflows surpassed this annual target by March.

In its PR19 plans, SWW boasted it would achieve a 4-star environmental performance rating, this was one of the key performance outcomes Ofwat cited as the reason that SWW would receive a financial reward. By 2023, the latest figures we had at the time of writing, it had only managed to hit 2 stars.

SWW states that it wants to “maintain excellent bathing water quality standards all year round, so everyone can enjoy our 860 miles of coastline, whatever the time of year”.

Last year, 3,168 sewage alerts were issued at bathing waters within South West Water’s region.

These alerts were throughout the year, with 541 alerts issued during the bathing season – May to September in England – and 2,627 alerts during the rest of the year. With such rampant pollution, we highly doubt the water quality will be anything close to excellent year-round.

The future for South West Water: a grim tide

After five years of SWW failing to meet targets, Ofwat has again dished out a reward for SWW’s next set of plans. This time it’s worth an equivalent to £36 million. 

One of those goals for the next 5 years will be familiar from last time: “The company will improve its environmental performance by achieving 4* Environmental Performance Assessment (EPA) status by 2028.” 

SWW also announced in February 2025 that it will be investing more than £700 million to reduce storm overflows across the region in the next five-year period.

The aim is to make SWW the first water company to meet the Government’s target of fewer than 10 discharges per year – an impressive 10 years ahead of deadline. 

SWW has a huge mountain to climb. 872 of its combined sewage overflows (CSOs) discharged over 10 times in 2024 (64% of their total overflows). 

And as it’s failed time and again to meet environmental targets over the past five years, how are we supposed to trust them now?“

Ah! Is this why SWW has just recruited “super hero” PR expert Simon Jupp.

The local MP rejected by the electorate but with all the connections? – Owl

See this post to find Simon’s ambiguous record on “holding South West Water to account”.