In response to appalled (and nose holding) questioning from Lib Dem Assembly Leader Mike Tuffrey, the water company pointed to the creaking Victorian system and our habit of concreting over our green spaces. The good news is they have planning and funding to improve London's five main sewage works and build the Lee Tunnel, with work scheduled to be completed by 2014. (Details for the Thames Tunnel are still being worked out, and wouldn't be finished by 2020 anyway.) But if this is a true Five Year Plan, we expect to see everything done and dusted ahead of schedule.
What this means for us is an exception to the Ofwat bill-capping; Thames Water will be allowed to increase bills by 3% above inflation, although this is still much less than the 17% it wanted. Perhaps we should expect to see another Stalinist planning tactic: significantly altered targets?
