Consultation under section 13 of the Water Industry Act 1991 on proposed modification to the largest undertakers’ licences for ring-fencing

About Consultation

This consultation invites comments on our proposals to modify conditions in the Instruments of Appointment (licences) of the 17 largest regulated water (and/or wastewater) companies (Appointees) in England and Wales, collectively referred to as ‘companies’ in the document.

Our intention is to bring these licences up to the industry-leading standard, including upgrading older-style ring-fence conditions to the most up to date wording except where that would entail a change in policy that we have not previously consulted upon. Additionally, we are proposing to apply the formatting and numbering changes and simplified wording we applied to other conditions in our Licence Simplification Project in December 2018.

These changes are important improvements to companies’ licences, and we have consulted extensively on this package already.  We have reflected on the views expressed already, and the proposals in this statutory consultation include several helpful refinements, while ensuring that the protections for all customers are brought up to the best common standards.  Our aim is to make these improvements with agreement – most companies have already provided their indicative consent to these changes.

Under section 13 of the Water Industry Act 1991 (WIA91), we are able to modify the conditions of a company’s licence if it agrees to the changes we are proposing to make.

This consultation document and the attached appendices is a Notice under section 13 of the WIA91.

How to respond

We invite stakeholders to comment on our proposed modifications by 25 June 2020. Companies should also indicate their agreement or otherwise of the proposed modification by this date. You can email your responses to [email protected]