Professor John Robertson OBA
This morning the Herald front page was all about the supposedly high cost of Scottish Water’s sewage spill clear-ups.
In 2024, the most recent figure, according to the Herald’s freedom of information ‘scoop’, it was £136 268.
Figures for the whole of England are not easy to find, but in August 2024, RWB Group, Specialist Providers of Inspection, Surveying, Flood Response, Drainage Repairs & Environmental Services, and Channel 4 reported:
The UK water regulator, Ofwat, recently proposed substantial fines totalling £168 million for three major water companies—Thames Water, Yorkshire Water, and Northumbrian Water—due to their repeated failures in managing sewage spills.
The fines break down as follows:
- Thames Water: £104 million
- Yorkshire Water: £47 million
- Northumbrian Water: £17 million https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/true-cost-sewage-spillage-fines-enough-protect-our-waterways-toope
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
As ever with the ‘Scottish’ (Scotland is pure bad) media, they quote a large number, with no context, and damn Scotland.
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How insane do you need to be to privatise WATER?
I’ve no idea how Thatcher managed to let AIR slip through her greedy net.
Danny Mitchell
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Thatcher and Tory and Labour insane. I wonder whose deep pockets benefitted from the sell off of England’s water, hmm..
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Has anyone attempted to compile the cost to Scotland of the ”sewage” which passes for news from various MSM outlets , such as The Herald ?
Given the constant outflow of misinformation , skewed reporting , negative news and , at times , downright lies , from much of the media in Scotland we are long overdue a ‘cleanup ‘ of epic proportions .
Damn Jackie Baillie would be the obvious candidate as a Sewage Tsar as she has a long history in this field .
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‘Has anyone attempted to compile the cost to Scotland of the ”sewage” which passes for news from various MSM outlets , such as The Herald ?’
I haven’t. But there is the cost to Scotland of still NOT being an independent nation-state within EFTA/EEA or the EU! The cost to Scotland of still NOT having an energy system and associated retail and wholesale markets designed to optimise the economic impacts of Scotland’s energy-rich status! The cost to Scotland of having to share the costs of weapons of mass destruction that Scotland has no need of! The costs to Scotland of having to mitigate Westminster’s harmful social support policies! And …. one could go on!
The cost to Scotland of still NOT having the AGENCY of a normal independent nation-state! Then there is the opportunity costs mounting annually! All linked to the malign influence on voters of an Anglo-British mainstream media willing and able to oppose Scotland’s self-determination by all journalistic means available to them.
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I don’t why people in England put up with having their water so contaminated while paying through the nose to private companies for it. Why don’t they demand it’s taken ‘back into public hands’, to quote Labour UK guy at Holyrood a few years back, Richard Leonard, who attempted to deceive the people of Scotland with his disgraceful lies, not sure if he was ever told to apologise for lying.
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No water company in England is going to outperform SW on any metric, that’s why Scotland’s media and political opposition are so desperate to grab any opportunity to imply it as failing organisation resulting from political decision – SW is by no means perfect, but by contrast with any english water company, it shines.
Yet it is too simplistic to blame the privatisation of water, look to the political interference in monitoring and regulation to see why it all went so pear-shaped in England – It will take decades and billions to undo the damage caused by London politics – Edinburgh politics has steadfastly remained hands-off with SEPA as it should be.
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