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Silhouette of business people negotiating at meeting table
Wessex Water chief executive Colin Skellett is set to step down from the helm of the company after more than 35 years in the role.
Wessex’s chief compliance officer, Ruth Jefferson, has been lined up to succeed Skellett and will officially assume the role on 30 September, Utility Week can reveal.
Skellett joined the company in 1974 and has served as chief executive since 1988 to see the company through the privatisation process.
Speaking to Utility Week ahead of his departure, Skellett said: “Ruth has great people skills and she absolutely gets the strong ethos of this company.”
Skellett guided Wessex through the transition to privatisation, helping the company and region to meet European Union directives on water, which had led to the government privatising the sector.
His career in the water sector began in the 1970s as a trainee chemist at a treatment plant in Nottingham when it was operated by the water authority. Skellett moved to Wessex in 1974 as district controller of around 60 works and 70 pumping stations.
In 1998, Wessex was acquired by Enron from its shareholders for £1.3 billion and run by the American company until it filed for bankruptcy in 2001. After that, the Malaysian infrastructure group YTL Corporation bought the water and sewerage company and continue to run the organisation since.
Skellett told Utility Week that he would remain working with Wessex’s parent company YTL in its Construction UK group, which is building a 6,500 home development north of Bristol in the former Filton Arfield.
Incoming chief executive Jefferson has worked at the water company for the past eight years in legal roles, most recently heading up the compliance team. Skellett said this experience would serve the business well.
“The regulatory focus on compliance is only going to get stronger and stronger,” Skellett added.
A full interview with Skellett will be published in an upcoming Digital Weekly issue of Utility Week.
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