South West Water fined £7.87m over sewage spills in Cornwall and Devon

South West Water was fined £7,867,733 at Plymouth Magistrates’ Court on 29 September after pleading guilty to 18 environmental offences involving sewage spills in Cornwall and Devon. The Environment Agency called it the largest fine for environmental offences imposed in the region. The sentence covers incidents from January 2015 to July 2021, bringing a present-day penalty for discharges at beaches, waterways and other sites.

District Judge Matson imposed the fine following an Environment Agency prosecution. The company must also pay £329,993 in costs and a £120 victim surcharge, the Agency said, with all penalties due within 56 days. The 18 guilty pleas comprised 17 charges of illegal water discharge and one charge of failing to take reasonable remedial measures after a pumping-station failure.

What the judge found

According to the Environment Agency’s account of the sentencing, the judge repeatedly found reckless failures in South West Water’s management systems and its response to known risks. She said pollution incidents could not be tolerated and described the offences as ‘horrendous, very significant incidents of pollution’. The full sentencing remarks were not separately available in the material reviewed for this report.

The Agency said the judge also found that, despite its guilty pleas, South West Water had tried to minimise its role in the offending instead of showing remorse and accepting full responsibility. That finding sits alongside the company’s later apology and its account of improvements at the affected sites; the latter are claims made by South West Water in response to the sentence.

Spills at beaches and waterways

At Harlyn beach, untreated sewage was discharged on 231 occasions between January 2016 and July 2021, according to the Agency. At sewage works near Bodmin, it recorded 336 illegal spills in the seven years to March 2020. The Agency quoted the judge as saying it was ‘significant and incredibly concerning’ that so many of the Bodmin spills had not been picked up by the company.

The case also included a combined sewer entering Budshead Creek in Plymouth. South West Water failed to provide a permanent repair despite repeated formal warnings from the Environment Agency, its account says. The pipe collapsed in 2020, leading to two pollution incidents in August and September. The judge found that the company knew the pipe was precarious but had done nothing about it for years before raw sewage entered the watercourse, according to the Agency.

The offences were spread across Bodmin, Harlyn, Playing Place, Polperro and Plymouth. Clarissa Newell, the Agency’s area environment manager, said the affected places included bathing waters, a designated Special Area of Conservation and a priority habitat. She said the regulator hoped the record fine would change the company’s approach to protecting the environment when it makes spending decisions.

Company response and wider record

In a response reported by The Guardian, South West Water called the offences ‘historic’ and apologised for what happened. It said most of the charges concerned the use of overflows during storm conditions and that it had made significant improvements at the sites involved. Those statements describe the company’s position; the sentencing account does not establish the present condition of each site.

The company also said it was investing £760 million to tackle storm overflows. It reported that spills had fallen 17% in the preceding year and that their duration had fallen 25%. The figures are South West Water’s own claims, reported by The Guardian, and are separate from the court’s findings about the earlier offences.

The Environment Agency’s separate 2024 performance assessment provides a measure of the company’s wider record. It recorded 189 sewerage pollution incidents, equivalent to 108 per 10,000 kilometres of sewer. The Agency rated that measure red and listed South West Water as the worst performer among the companies compared. These figures describe 2024 performance, rather than the offences resolved in this sentencing.

The Agency said the company had also been fined £2.15 million in 2023 after a prosecution involving 13 charges dating from July 2016 to August 2020. That earlier case is distinct from Tuesday’s sentence. Environment Secretary Angela Eagle said the new sentence showed that companies wilfully ignoring their obligations would face consequences, and cited planned changes to regulation, enforcement and accountability.

What remains to be decided

Six other criminal charges relating to spills at Holywell Sewage Pumping Station remain to be considered. South West Water has already pleaded guilty to them, the Environment Agency said, but the date for their consideration has yet to be set. Tuesday’s fine, costs and surcharge concern the 18 charges sentenced at Plymouth, leaving that separate matter outstanding.