News

The Water Conservators have responded to the Ofwat June 2026 Consultation under sections 13 and 12A of the Water Industry Act 1991 on proposed licence modifications to introduce asset management competence for all water companies

This is a summary of our response.

Britain’s water companies are inconsistent in the way they operate, maintain and manage their physical assets and need to improve, says the Worshipful Company of Water Conservators.

The Company supports in principle the regulator Ofwat’s proposal to introduce a formal requirement for companies to display competence in the management of their assets, by way of an amendment to their licences.

But the Company would like to see important modifications to the proposals, to improve the transparency and robustness of the new regime.

Ofwat, the Independent Water Commission and the government’s white paper on water have all identified shortcomings in the present asset management regime, with wide differences in the way companies operate, maintain and manage assets now and for the future.

Among the Water Conservators’ recommendations are the following:

Ofwat should define competence in asset management more tightly, and link it to measurable outcomes, in order to prevent a paper-compliance or certificate-only culture;

Each company should make accountability for asset management a board-level responsibility, and there should be a named executive in each company responsible for managing assets;

Judging different companies’ performance on asset management should be made easier by spelling out an “evidential floor” for comparing companies’ performance in future; this should specify the minimum evidence companies should supply to the regulator on issues such as their asset inventory, those assets’ condition, company maintenance programmes and long-term scenarios;

And each company should publish a short statement of asset-management competence and an improvement plan each year.

The Company supports the removal of the obsolete Condition L in existing licences, so long as companies provide robust evidence of the condition and history of underground infrastructure along with a maintenance strategy, to avoid a regulatory blind spot for mains and sewers.

The Company supports the decision not to mandate ISO 55001 certification, but only if an alternative provides a genuinely consistent, comparable and independently-assessed approach. The alternative route should require an assessor with demonstrable water-sector and asset-management competence, independence from management and major delivery advisers, and a duty to report material weaknesses.

The Company recommends that Ofwat consider the findings of related inquiries into asset failures in sectors other than water, including the Grenfell Inquiry. It should also take account of the requirements for competency set out in the Building Safety Act.

The Company’s full response can be found in the consultations section of this website.