Water firm bosses' salaries branded 'insult' to NHS workers

The "extortionate" salaries paid to water company bosses have been branded an "insult" to NHS workers who run the health service. NHS England's former boss Amanda Pritchard was paid around £270,000 for overseeing a £205billion budget.

But Thames Waters' CEO Chris Weston got a £850,000 salary with a £195,000 bonus for running a £20.5billion company with over £19billion of debt. Mr Weston was paid the bonus for three months of work after he joined the company in January 2024.

Professor Becky Malby, of the Ilkley Clean River Group, said: "Running Thames Water is complicated but it pales into insignificance in comparison to the complexity of running the NHS.

"Delivering clean water and treating pollution is pretty straightforward. It is shocking to hear the Chair of Thames water, and then Sir Jon Cunliffe who is undertaking the government's review [of the sector], persistently arguing that water company CEO roles are difficult and the salaries reflect the need to attract the best people. How can the government take them seriously?

"Running one company in the water industry is definitely not harder than running the NHS. The extortionate salaries at the top of Thames and every other water company are an insult to NHS leaders, doctors, nurses and the healthcare professionals that run our vital services. If we tolerate this, what are we saying about the value we place on the NHS?"

Prof Malby is among the academics who launched a people's commission into the industry to "fill the gaps" of the government-appointed Cunliffe commission.

The Cunliffe inquiry into the water sector, which is due to report later this month, was prevented from considering public ownership by the remit imposed by ministers.

It comes as Thames Water paid almost £2.5million to senior managers from an emergency loan that was meant to be used to keep the failing utilities company afloat - and has refused to claw back the payments.

The struggling water supplier paid bonuses totalling £2.46million to 21 managers on 30 April.

Thames Water, which serves 16 million customers in London and south-east England, this week warned households it would announce a hosepipe ban unless the water shortage changed significantly.

A Thames Water spokesman said: "The management retention plan (MRP) was established as part of the liquidity extension with the objective of retaining senior management during a complex recapitalisation that will see the company return to a stable financial and operational foundation ...

"Retention plans are commonplace in these types of deals for precisely this purpose and ours was based on extensive benchmarking of similar capital market events like M&A deals and restructurings."

The water company declined to comment on the comparison with the NHS.