In a Guardian opinion piece, Green party peer Jenny Jones explains why she has stopped paying the sewage element of her Thames Water bill, in protest at the company's repeated pollution of rivers and coastlines. She frames the move as a direct response to government inaction, arguing that water companies are failing their basic duties while imposing hosepipe bans, leaking a fifth of supply, and prioritising shareholder payouts and debt interest over infrastructure fixes.

Jones cites an Environment Agency finding that serious pollution incidents by English water companies rose 60% in a year, with Thames Water named the worst offender. She has written to Thames Water offering to pay only for water supply, not sewage treatment, but received a threatening letter and an increased bill with penalty charges in response; she says she will contest any resulting court case. She likens the tactic to the 1990s poll tax non-payment campaign and calls for renationalisation, dismissing the government's oft-cited £100bn takeover cost as inflated because it includes company debt, while also criticising the lack of prosecutions against water company bosses.