Welsh Water reveals record investment levels

Welsh Water has announced record levels of investment, with £219 million always spent on capital projects in the first six months of the year.

The not-for-profit water company confirmed today (15 November) it is on track to invest £460 million over the current financial year as it works to bolster resilience in the face of future climate change.

But the company’s financial results also show it made an underlying loss of £28 million in the six months to September 2018, compared to a loss of £15 million in the same time period last year.

According to the operator, this was mainly due to higher operating costs due to bad weather, higher asset appreciation charges and higher interest charges following a successful 18-year bond issue.

The company also confirmed that its average household customer bills in 2018 were held below the Retail Prices Index for the ninth year in a row.

And the not-for-profit also revealed it now supports with its range of social tariffs more than 100,000 customers who genuinely struggle to pay their bills, at a cost to the company of £7 million a year.

Welsh Water’s results come a day after SSE announced a fall in adjusted pre-tax profits of more than 40 per cent in its latest set of financial figures.

The company’s interim results for the six months to 30 September include a 40.9 per cent fall in underlying pre-tax profits to £246.4 million.

“The last six months have been exceptionally challenging for the company with a number of weather-related events testing how we can maintain services to customers in the most difficult circumstances,” said Welsh Water’s non-executive chairman, Alastair Lyons.

“Despite these challenges, we have managed to maintain good overall performance in meeting our key customer service goals and ensuring our bills are affordable for customers, in no small part down to the fantastic response and hard work of our people and partner organisations.”