Leaders of communities featuring rivers which have repeatedly been polluted by sewage have called on Yorkshire Water’s chief executive to refuse her £371,000 annual bonus.
Richmond councillor Stuart Parsons and Pateley Bridge and Nidderdale councillor Andrew Murday said Nicola Shaw should not take her bonus for the second year in succession following a succession of pollution incidents and criticisms about the firm’s actions.
The Liberal Democrat and Independent councillors have issued the call after Conservative-led North Yorkshire Council’s executive member for the environment, Councillor Greg White rejected adding his name to those pressuring Ms Shaw over the bonus, saying he did not have a view on it.
Coun White said her salary, which last year was £585,000, and bonus, which were “a matter for the company’s board and the industry regulator”.
He added: “I will say that, whilst the figures are substantial in terms of one person’s salary, they are not particularly significant in terms of Yorkshire Water’s revenue and capital budgets.
“I prefer to concentrate my efforts on getting Yorkshire Water to deal with local residents’ concerns and deliver an effective and efficient service. To be fair, in my experience, the company does seem willing to engage.”
The payout, part of bonus system that could be banned under proposals outlined by the Labour Government, was detailed in the company’s annual report last month, alongside plans to make bosses of water companies face personal criminal liability for breaking laws on water quality.
Last year Yorkshire Water, which serves five million customers, was named by the Environment Agency as the second-worst water company in England for sewage spills from storm overflows.
In April, water regulator Ofwat said Yorkshire Water had failed customers after a burst water pipe in Goole affected 12,700 people for more than two weeks.
Last month, a meeting of North Yorkshire Council’s environment scrutiny committee heard calls for the authority to become “confrontational” over escalating water quality issues and for Yorkshire Water to be fined for failing to complete planned maintenance on time and for shoddy work to repair roads.
Coun Murday said sewage spillages should be rare rather than a regular
occurrence.
He said: “The problem about the bonus is that it creates entirely the wrong impression. People seeing that think Yorkshire Water don’t care.
“Sewage spills are continuing at a horrendous rate, across all North Yorkshire’s rivers.”
Coun Parsons said the company’s executives should only be given a minimal wage until they “manage to turn off the sewage”.
He said: “These so-called high-flying executives are not worth a paperclip, let alone a salary and a bonus.”
Yorkshire Water said its bonus scheme took into account customer service and environmental measures, as well as considering the wider performance of the business.
A spokesman for the firm said: “Over the past year we’ve been making great strides to improve our performance as a company and the hard work is starting to pay off.”
Yorkshire Water singled out as the second-worst water company for sewage discharge from storm overflows.
The company said its sewage discharge figures was “due to the industrial heritage of parts of our region, and the way the network was created at the time”, adding that it was investing £180m to reduce discharges into watercourses from our storm overflows.
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