"Unprecedented" Failings With Southern Water's Island Infrastructure, Damning Report Finds

"Unprecedented" failings with Southern Water's (SW) Isle of Wight supply network is causing extensive damage to the Island's roads and leading to the loss of huge amounts of water on a daily basis, a damning report has found.

A review of the utility firm's performance revealed there were more than 800 "urgent" excavations to the Island's highway network between May and August.

And with immediate repairs more than doubling in the last three years, Island Roads (IRs) said the number of failings had reached "unsustainable" levels.

The report, which was put together for the Isle of Wight Council, found SW's infrastructure had been a "matter of concern" for many years.

It said the network "continues to cause both damage to the highway as well as disruption to those who use the local road network."

Among the findings were an increase in leaking or burst pipes, which IRs put down to "either poor quality of workmanship or, most likely, the extreme fragility of the supply network."

The report said:

"Leaking apparatus causes untold delays to programmed works and measurable damage to both existing and newly treated sections of footway or carriageway.

"The absence of any programme of works to replace aged sections of the network is self-evident with the number of main replacement works fallen to its lowest level on record."

Island Roads identified several sites where leaking or burst pipes is likely to have led to structural damage.

Newport Road in Sandown, Parkhurst Road in Newport, Bridge Road in Cowes, Copse Lane in Freshwater, Forest Road in Newport and Rew Street in Cowes have all had five or more burst pipes.

Meanwhile, engineers were called to multiple leaks at Carter Avenue in Shanklin (27), Carisbrooke Road in Newport (18) Sandown Road in Sandown (16), Argyll Street in Ryde (13), Adelaide Grove in East Cowes (9) and Colwell Road in Freshwater (8).

Failures with the foul waste system had also resulted in damage to the highway or footway at the following sites, the report found:

• Tennyson Road, Yarmouth
• Hope Hill, Shanklin
• Shore Hill, Ventnor
• North Walk, Ryde.

The findings come less than a month after SW announced plans to invest more than £56 million in water and wastewater services on the Isle of Wight.

At the time Isle of Wight MP Bob Seely said he welcomed the news "with caution". He said:

"While I welcome their investment in the Island, I want to ensure that these schemes will fix the worst problems.

“I also want to know what their plans are to invest in their infrastructure under roads and people’s homes to avoid disruptive works and potential flooding.

“I will be writing to them again with more questions and I will be monitoring their performance closely.”

Commenting on the report's findings, Isle of Wight councillor Cllr Richard Quigley, said:

"There has, quite rightly, been a lot of attention on Southern Water’s all-too frequent discharges of sewage into the Solent. However, the issue of poor infrastructure running beneath our roads and pavements also needs to be kept at the top of the agenda.

"This issue was brought into focus recently during the resurfacing of Moorgreen Road in Cowes which is in my ward. On visiting the site, it immediately became clear that the pipework serving domestic properties was hopelessly antiquated.

"Numerous leaks were sprung (some still not repaired) as the road was excavated extending a resurfacing scheme that should have lasted days into one that instead lasted weeks – much to the inconvenience of locals.

"Amazingly, it also became clear that there were still lead pipes bringing water into people’s homes. Though Southern Water assures me that this meets all safety requirements, that we still have lead pipes taking drinking water into homes is a poor indictment of the age of its domestic water infrastructure...

"Subsequent inquiries have yielded some similarly astonishing and unacceptable results. On 800 occasions between May and August this year, Southern Water needed roadworks, many causing local inconvenience, to repair leaks. Much of this work was on recently resurfaced roads.

"Furthermore, in the past two years, 278 notices have been issued on behalf of the IW Council requiring work by Southern Water to ensure the safety of road users is not compromised by faulty apparatus. Southern Water has yet to respond to around half of those.

"I was told by Southern Water directly that 3 million litres of water (which is about 30,000 baths) is lost from the Island’s water system every single day. That is an appalling waste of water at a time when are all trying to preserve natural resources.

"All this is a clear failure of privatisation. A service for which all of us pay considerable amounts annually is failing well short of what we should expect.

"The IW Council’s scrutiny committee, of which I am a member, is looking at this issue - the MP also. I like him, view Southern Water’s announcement of investment to come with caution."

Isle of Wight Radio has contacted Southern Water for a response to Island Road's findings.