Latest news with #Defra
Telegraph
17 hours ago
- Business
- Telegraph
How to get up to £2,000 by complaining to your water company
Water companies must now pay households up to £2,000 in compensation for service failures as part of wider government efforts to reform the sector. Payout rates have increased by as much as tenfold, marking the first rise in 25 years. The industry has come under mounting scrutiny, as bills have soared and firms have failed to invest adequately in ageing infrastructure. Leaking pipes, repeated sewage discharges into rivers and seas, and unfair executive bonuses have fuelled widespread public anger. Following an investigation by Jon Cunliffe, former Bank of England deputy governor, the Government has announced that it is scrapping Ofwat, the current regulator. Instead, a new regulator will oversee all water functions across Ofwat, the Environment Agency, Natural England and the Drinking Water Inspectorate. The news comes as water bills are estimated to rise 30pc over the next five years. Following reforms earlier in the year, as set out by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and enforced by Ofwat, customers affected by poor service are entitled to significantly higher compensation. Here, Telegraph Money explains how much you could receive and when, and what to do if your water company refuses to pay. What can you be compensated for? How do you make a claim? How much compensation could you get? What if your water company won't pay out? What can you be compensated for? Households are entitled to compensation if their water company fails to meet minimum service standards, as set out by the guaranteed standards scheme (GSS). These include: Failure to provide at least 48 hours' notice of a planned interruption to a water supply lasting more than four hours. Persistent low water pressure. Sewerage flooding, both inside your property and outside (such as gardens and driveways). Failure to restore a water supply on time. Missed or delayed appointments by your water company, or changes to scheduled visits without 24 hours' notice. Delays in dealing with complaints, requests for payment changes or account queries. The Government is also working with water companies to expand the list of circumstances that will trigger compensation payments. From October, customers will also be entitled to compensation if they are asked to boil their water due to a contaminated supply or their smart meter isn't read at least once in a 13-month period. How do you make a claim? In most cases, compensation payments should be automatic. If a company fails to meet the necessary minimum standards, it must make a fixed payment or credit the amount to your account. Automatic payments should usually be made within 20 working days of the incident occurring. This is reduced to 10 working days for delays in dealing with account enquiries, payment changes or issues with appointments. The exception is if you experience external sewerage flooding. In this instance, you will need to claim compensation via your water company. Most companies have claims forms on their websites, or you can get in touch with your provider for more information. How much compensation could you get? The recent changes mark the first time compensation rates have increased in 25 years in recognition of the 'urgent need to bring payments in line with inflation and properly compensate households for poor service', according to Defra. The table below outlines the amounts all water companies in England must now compensate households, and how they compare to previous rates. There are separate rates of compensation for businesses. What if your water company won't pay out? If you believe you're entitled to compensation and haven't received it, or if your issue isn't covered by the GSS (such as billing errors), start by raising a complaint directly with your water company. Currently, a water company must respond within 10 working days. If it doesn't, you can escalate the complaint, and the water company has a further 10 working days to respond. If the issue isn't resolved or you're not happy with the outcome, you can take your complaint to Consumer Council for Water (CCW), which will investigate. You can do this by email or letter, by filling in an online form or over the phone. Currently, there is no ombudsman for the water sector, although this could change as part of the planned overhaul, creating a new body with enhanced legal powers. Be prepared to supply the relevant information, including copies of any communication with your supplier. A spokesperson for CCW said: 'Where CCW cannot resolve disputes relating to GSS payments, the case can be referred to Ofwat, which has the power to make a final decision.'
Spectator
a day ago
- General
- Spectator
Bring back the milkman!
Even if you couldn't care a fig for sustainability, it's hard not to be impressed with the Nostradamus-esque foresight of the milk float. In an era when Old King Coal ruled the roost and recycling meant pedalling backwards on your Raleigh Grifter, the pre-dawn hour across the UK was the stage for a phalanx of electric vehicles trundling along our streets and lanes delivering our order of gold or silver top in reusable, pint-sized bottles. The decline of the milkman in percentage figures would cause palpitations to the most hardened of economic wonks. In the 1970s, 94 per cent of Britons had their milk delivered to their doorstep via an electric float – while in 2016 just 3 per cent of milk was delivered by milkmen, according to Defra. What happened? Well, of course, supermarkets happened, selling slightly cheaper milk which could be stored in ever-larger domestic fridges. Add in the introduction of long-life milk and UHT milk, and the milkman (I refuse to modernise this to milk-person or dairy udder-ling) became an endangered species. The UK is not, contrary to popular perception, the only country in the world to have milkmen. In the Philippines they're called lecheros and in rural India you might get your milk delivered still in its churn. But we're the only country who ever offered such coast to coast coverage of a morning. And am I the only person who feels we've lost something when there is a whole generation who have never depressed the foil on a pint of gold top and realised that they can't actually pour the milk, so solid is the layer of Jersey cream at the top of the bottle? Cholesterol-saturated bliss – and my goodness it tasted good on cornflakes. Yet unlike slam-door train carriages and Eric Morecambe, this is a form of nostalgia that could actually be revived right now if we fancy it. The milkman still exists, albeit in truncated form. And in a world where we are getting everything from sushi to second-hand clothes delivered to our homes, it's odd that the original, straight-to-your-door pioneers haven't managed to harness our recent reluctance (going strong since March 2020 for many people) to leave the house for anything other than a doctor's appointment. I should state here that I have absolutely no affiliation with a dairy of any kind and the closest I've come to promoting the milkman is lending my mate Simon a fiver until payday when he worked a float as a teenager in the 1990s in Chester. But consider the advantages. Comparing one of the remaining milk delivery services (Milk and More is one of the most popular, in case you're wondering) with the average supermarket shows that a pint of milk delivered to your door costs about 40p more than trekking down to the shop. That's a pretty tiny delivery charge compared with Just Eat or Amazon. Not only that, but to get your supermarket milk at that price per pint, you'd have to buy at least a litre – an amount you might not necessarily want to consume straight away, or have space in your freezer for. A glass bottle of milk in the door of your fridge is also aesthetically pleasing; it looks as comfortable and natural (even in a modern fridge) as a knob of melting butter on a jacket potato or Christopher Lee in a tweed jacket in The Wicker Man. And finally, while nobody was watching, dairies have seriously upped their game in terms of what else you can have delivered along with your pint of silver top. When I was a teenager, there was the option of eggs or very poor quality orange juice. Now, you can order pizza, pastries, plant seeds, biscuits and vegetable boxes. Patriotism is rarely a match for harsh economic truths in Britain. And the demise of the milkman can be put down to the perception that it's 'cheaper in Sainsbury's'. Yet any potential milkman revival doesn't have to be the exclusive domain of rosy-spectacle donning hipsters who admire the sustainable aesthetic. To use your milkman (if you can find one) is to do something that, in a picayune yet vital way, brings communities back together. Macabre as this is, there was a time when a pile-up of bottles outside someone's door was an instant signal to neighbours that all was not well. And while the clanging of bottles at dawn may not be the wake-up call you most desire, it's preferable to the bilious sound of delivery motorbikes and people who think it's acceptable to turn their car radio on at full volume at 6 a.m. before actually closing the door. The milk industry has, to be frank, completely failed to raise public awareness as to their natural fit into our dubious new world of ubiquitous home delivery. So I'm going to do it for them. Putting gold top on your cornflakes may be ruinous to your arteries. But the milkman deserves a revival all the same, even though I never did get that loaned 'until payday' fiver back. Simon, if you're reading this, time to cough up mate. And I'll have six eggs and a veg box while you're at it.
Local France
a day ago
- Health
- Local France
Why has the UK banned imports of French and Italian cheeses?
Bad news for UK residents who like iconic French cheeses such as artisan-produced brie, roquefort and reblochon or Italian classics such as pecorino ... these will no longer be available after the UK banned their imports from France or Italy. However if you are in those countries - or any other EU country - you can enjoy them to your heart's content. So what's going on? The UK's agriculture ministry Defra says that all imports of cheeses made in France or Italy with unpasturised milk are now banned. This affects any cheese made with raw milk or unpasturised milk - including some of France's most famous cheeses such as Vacherin, Roquefort, Mimolette and Tomme. Brie made by small artisan producers is likely to be unpasturised, although factory-produced brie can be made with pasturised milk. Advertisement It affects fewer Italian cheeses as the big names such as Parmesan are made with pasturised milk, but artisan-produced mozzarella is often made with raw milk, as is pecorino. You can find a full list of the affected cheeses here . Any cheeses produced before May 23rd are exempt, if the importer can produce the necessary paperwork - meaning that shortages will become apparent gradually, as some aged cheeses will continue to be imported over the next few months. The rules mostly affect commercial imports, but theoretically also apply to holidaymakers wanting to bring back a wheel of lovely, stinky European cheese. All of the above cheeses remain on sale throughout the EU. So why the UK ban? It's due to an outbreak of a cattle disease with the imaginative name of Lumpy Skin Disease (LSD) which, you will be surprised to hear, causes lumps on the skin of affected cattle. In France the disease is known as dermatose nodulaire contagieuse (DNC). It is spread by the bites of flies and mosquitoes. Italy confirmed its first case in Sardinia on June 21st, 2025, leading the UK to revoke Italy's LSD-free status and suspend unpasturised imports. France reported its first LSD case near Chambéry on June 29th. Quarantine zones are in place in the affected areas with a vaccination programme for the cattle, but cheese sales have not been suspended. The UK's import ban also affects the import of live cattle. Can Lumpy Skin Disease be spread by eating cheese? No, there is no risk to humans from eating cheese that has been produced by a cow suffering from LSD, and in fact humans cannot get LSD under any circumstances. The UK government says that it is acting to prevent the spread of the virus among British cattle - hence the ban on live cattle imports. It says that the virus can survive in raw milk, including cheese made with raw milk. So if a British cow ate a brie sandwich then it could get Lumpy Skin Disease. That sounds like a small risk? Frustrated cheese sellers in the UK say that the ban is disproportionate. Cheese-mongers told The Grocer magazine that the ban is "costly, illogical and deeply frustrating", saying there is no risk to people from these cheeses. Advertisement Shane Holland, a cheese retailer based in London, told UK newspaper The Independent : "The bigger question is, what is the ban for? "We completely understand restricting the movement of live cattle. LSD is an infectious disease from cattle to cattle. But if we're talking about from cattle to milk, there's no cattle-to-human transmission at all. Even if there was the tiniest risk, it's not being consumed by cattle anyway." A Defra spokesperson stood by the ban, saying: 'This government will do whatever it takes to protect British farmers and their herds from disease,' adding that most Italian cheeses, such as Parmesan, Mozzarella and Gorgonzola, should be unaffected as they are largely pasteurised. However the UK is not the only country to impose a ban - Canada has also banned imports of unpasturised cheese from France, Italy and Switzerland. Advertisement Is this why Eurostar is telling me I can't take a ham sandwich on my journey from Paris to London? No, that's a different issue, it's because of an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in continental Europe. Germany detected an outbreak in January but has since been declared FMD-free, however subsequent outbreaks in Hungary and Slovakia have persisted. In response, the UK recently announced that it has banned imports of meat or dairy products from European countries where the virus has been detected, as well as Austria due to the outbreak in neighbouring Hungary. However travellers are being advised that meat and dairy products from all EU countries are banned, which is why you may have received an email from Eurostar or ferry companies if you have recently travelled from France to the UK. Foot and mouth disease does not affect humans but is highly contagious among cattle. A major outbreak in the UK in 2001 led to the culling of more than six million animals and cost the economy billions, devastating the livestock industry and tourism.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
UK shops to take on full cost of packaging waste disposal
Retailers across the UK are preparing for the rollout of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), a landmark regulation that will shift the full cost of household packaging waste disposal from local authorities to producers. Set to take effect from October 2025, the scheme is expected to cost the industry around £2 billion annually, with significant implications for packaging strategies, supply chains and product pricing. How EPR changes the cost of packaging waste Under the EPR scheme, retailers and manufacturers will be required to pay fees based on the type, weight, and recyclability of the packaging they place on the market. This replaces the current shared-cost system, where local councils bear most of the expense for collecting and processing packaging waste. The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) confirmed that modulated fees will apply from 2026, meaning that producers using easier-to-recycle materials will pay less. This aims to encourage eco-friendly packaging design and a reduction in hard-to-recycle plastics. For now, fees will be calculated based on total packaging volumes reported by businesses for 2023, with the first invoices due next year. Retail sector faces cost and compliance pressure Retailers are concerned about the financial burden and administrative complexity of complying with the new rules. Industry groups such as the British Retail Consortium (BRC) have called for greater clarity around fee calculations and how the funds will be used to improve recycling infrastructure. Helen Dickinson, Chief Executive of the BRC, said the new EPR scheme must 'deliver value for money and transparency.' She also urged the government to reinvest funds into developing a more effective waste collection system that supports retailers in achieving their sustainability goals. Large brands have warned that some of the costs may ultimately be passed on to consumers. According to the Food and Drink Federation, the EPR rollout could lead to increased prices across everyday goods if retailers and suppliers are unable to absorb the additional charges. Data reporting and packaging design under scrutiny Retailers have already begun adjusting their packaging strategies to minimise liability under EPR. This includes reducing packaging weight, eliminating unnecessary materials, and switching to widely recyclable formats. Businesses with an annual turnover above £2 million and placing more than 50 tonnes of packaging on the UK market must also register with the EPR system and submit detailed packaging data. The data reporting requirement, which began in 2023, has proven challenging for many organisations. A lack of centralised guidance and inconsistencies in local recycling services have made it difficult for businesses to assess the recyclability of certain materials. Retailers are also reviewing product design, sourcing and labelling practices in preparation for modulated fees. Some are accelerating plans to adopt mono-material solutions or move away from coloured plastics that cannot be recycled at scale. "UK shops to take on full cost of packaging waste disposal" was originally created and published by Retail Insight Network, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
The Independent
3 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
Water industry review unlikely to spark required change, claims Feargal Sharkey
Water campaigner Feargal Sharkey says he believes a landmark review into the water industry will not produce changes the public and customers desperately need. The Independent Water Commission, led by former Bank of England deputy governor Sir Jon Cunliffe, will outline recommendations to turn around the floundering sector in its final report on Monday, with claims it will lead to the abolition of embattled water regulator Ofwat. But former Undertones frontman Sharkey, who has become a leading campaigner for water companies to clean up their act, said he fears the highly anticipated report will be a 'flat pancake'. He told the PA news agency: 'We were promised that the report will bring us champagne – but it will just be a saucer of milk.' Sharkey, who has given evidence to MPs on the need for reform and has spoken at numerous public and trade union meetings, said he does not believe 'much will happen' as a result of the report's findings. 'Sir Jon's job is to make the current system better, but so many things have not been considered in his review, such as the ownership of the water companies. 'I also don't think you can talk about abolishing Ofwat without considering the future of the Environment Agency – and taking a long, hard look at the Environment Department (Defra), as well as the lack of action from government ministers for many years. They are just as culpable.' Sharkey said governments have had the power to punish water companies over sewage pollution, or the 'scandal' of paying huge bonuses to bosses, but had chosen not to use them for years. He believes the public and customers have been treated with 'contempt' by water companies for years despite outrage over sewage pollution of rivers and waterways. He added the fact that the review had been held was a victory for the many small community groups across the country set up to tackle the crisis. The review was commissioned by the UK and Welsh governments as part of their response to systemic industry failures, which include rising bills, record sewage spills and debt-ridden company finances, although ministers have ruled out nationalising companies. A Government spokesperson pointed out that unfair bonuses have been banned for senior executives at six water companies under new measures which came into force last month. The Government said at the time that transformative change across the water sector was needed to clean up rivers, lakes and seas, and modernise the sector for decades to come. Under the rules, companies are not permitted to pay bonuses to water bosses that oversee poor environmental and customer outcomes.
