The Canada Pension Plan owns one-third of Anglian Water Services, which sells water services to approximately six million people in England.
The Colchester (UK) Gazette reports, “A water company has been fined thousands of pounds after discharging too much sewage into the sea in Clacton. Anglian Water was taken to court by the Environment Agency for breaching its permit to discharge up to 27,419 cubic metres of secondary-treated sewage into the water each day. Too much of the discharge was pumped into the sea from Clacton Sewage Treatment Works, in Holland Haven, on two occasions last year.”
The article notes, “Anglian Water admitted the charges at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday. The company was fined a total of £28,000, as well as being ordered to pay costs of £3,375 and a victim surcharge of £120. Environment Agency senior officer Jamie Fairfull said: ‘There has been a long history of permit breaches at the site and the incidents in 2012 involved significant breaches of a permit condition.'”
In 2011, Anglian Water Services posted a profit of $507 million. In November 2012, the Guardian UK reported, “Anglian Water paid no corporation tax on its regulated water business in the financial year ending in March.” Meanwhile, the Times UK has noted the growing number of households that suffer from ‘water poverty’, which is defined as when water bills make up more than 3 per cent of household spending. Since water was privatized in 1989, bills have increased by 42 per cent.
Canada Pension Plan funds shouldn’t be invested in for-profit, private water.
Further reading
CETA would hinder water remunicipalization in England
Private water companies in England enjoy huge profits, pay little or no corporate taxes
Water poverty in the UK as rates increase, the recession hits
