Danger to life weather warning as thunderstorms set to hit England

Parts of southern England are set to be battered by torrential rain on Saturday which could cause “significant” flooding and a danger to life, the Met Office said.

An amber warning for thunderstorms has been issued for between 4am and 11am spanning major towns and cities including London, Brighton, Portsmouth, Chelmsford, St Albans and Cambridge.

Forecasters have warned of sudden flooding in roads and homes with some more remote communities at risk of being cut off, while delays to train and bus services are also likely.

Power cuts could also occur and buildings are at risk of damage from floodwater, lightning strikes, hail and strong winds.

It is one of several weather warnings for thunderstorms issued across the country.

On Friday, two yellow warnings are in place with one covering much of Yorkshire and the north east of England from 11am to 8pm on Friday. The second will come into place at 9pm until 11:49pm in London and the south east.

On Saturday, two yellow warnings will be in place alongside the more severe amber alert. Most of England will be covered by a yellow warning from midnight to 9pm. Eastern Scotland is also facing a yellow warning from 4pm until midday on Sunday.

A further warning for the south west of England will also come into place at midday on Sunday and remain until 3am on Monday.

The downpours will be fuelled by warm and humid airmass moving across the country over the coming days, the Met Office said.

Met Office Chief Meteorologist Jason Kelly, said: “Within the warm and humid airmass we will potentially see temperatures reaching 30°C or more for parts of eastern England by Friday, with very warm and muggy conditions continuing into the weekend in parts of central and southern England.”

Looking ahead to next week, the unsettled pattern is expected to continue, with showers and thunderstorms at times, although some drier, brighter interludes are also likely. Temperatures will be near normal or warm for the time of year, depending on sunshine.

By midweek, conditions may begin to settle from the west, though eastern areas could still see showers. Temperatures are expected to be near or slightly above normal, with warmth in sunnier areas.

It comes as Southern Water has become the latest company to bring in a hosepipe ban, to protect rare chalk stream habitat, as England battles exceptionally dry weather.

The company said restrictions on hosepipes for activities such as watering gardens, filling paddling pools or washing cars would come in for households in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight from Monday.

It is the latest announcement by water companies bringing in hosepipe bans in response to the driest start to the year since 1976 for England.

Rainfall across England was 20 per cent less than the long-term average for June, which was also the hottest on record for the country, with two heatwaves driving unusually high water demand, the Environment Agency has said.

Drought was declared in the East and West Midlands on Tuesday, with the region joining swathes of northern England in being impacted by the lack of rainfall.

Russian spies who ‘targeted Britain in sustained campaign’ sanctioned

Britain has hit more than a dozen Russian spies with a wave of sanctions, targeting those it accused of running a “sustained campaign” of malicious activity against the UK.

The Foreign Office named 18 officers from Russian spy agency the GRU, as well as hitting three of its units with measures aimed at cracking down on Vladimir Putin’s increasing aggression abroad.

It said the military intelligence officers targeted were “responsible for spreading chaos and disorder on Putin’s orders”, and included those who had targeted the family of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal.

The officers sanctioned had targeted a device belonging to Mr Skripal’s daughter Yulia with malicious malware known as X-Agent five years before GRU attempted to murder them in Salisbury with the deadly Novichok nerve agent.

The units are also accused of conducting a prolonged campaign of cyberattacks across Europe, including in Britain, aimed at destabilising the continent and undermining democratic institutions.

“GRU spies are running a campaign to destabilise Europe, undermine Ukraine’s sovereignty and threaten the safety of British citizens,” foreign secretary David Lammy said.

He added: “The Kremlin should be in no doubt: we see what they are trying to do in the shadows and we won’t tolerate it. That’s why we’re taking decisive action with sanctions against Russian spies.”

On 15 March 2022, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, Unit 26165 carried out online reconnaissance on civilian bomb shelters in Mariupol, southern Ukraine and in Kharkiv, eastern Ukraine, the Foreign Office said.

One of the targets was the Mariupol theatre. Civilians sheltering inside from Russian bombs had painted the word “children” outside in the hopes they would be spared.

But the next day, the theatre was hit by Russian airstrikes, killing about 600 people, including children, according to an Associated Press investigation.

In 2013, officers from the same unit had targeted the daughter of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal with malware, designed to harm or infiltrate computer systems, the foreign ministry said.

In 2018, Mr Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury, in an attack the British government said was organised by Russian intelligence. The Skripals survived the attack on British soil but a woman, Dawn Sturgess, was killed after her boyfriend stumbled across the poison in a perfume bottle.

The sanctions also targeted the Africa Initiative, which the Foreign Office said employed Russian intelligence officers to carry out information operations in Africa, including undermining public health programmes and destabilising various countries.

Russia’s campaign of sabotage and disruption across Europe ranges from cyberattacks and propaganda to arson and attempted assassination. Mr Lammy said: “Putin’s hybrid threats and aggression will never break our resolve. The UK and our allies’ support for Ukraine and Europe’s security is ironclad.”

More than 70 different attacks have been attributed to Russia by Western officials since the invasion.

The military intelligence units sanctioned on Friday also targeted foreign aid to Kyiv, ports, infrastructure and border crossings as well as technology companies, the Foreign Office said.

Although targeting GRU officers with sanctions is likely to have limited effect, the ministry said the goal is to raise awareness of Russia’s campaign and raise the cost to people working for its services, including making it harder for them to travel.

Police confirm 10-year-old boy was killed in Somerset school bus crash

The child who died in a school bus crash in Somerset has been confirmed as a 10-year-old boy, Avon and Somerset Police said on Friday. He has not yet been named.

Police added that six other children and three adults, including the driver, remain in hospital.

Between 60 and 70 people were on board the bus, which was heading back to Minehead Middle School after a day trip for Year 5 classes to Exmoor Zoo.

The vehicle left the A396 at Cutcombe Hill near Minehead, on Thursday afternoon, sliding down a 20ft slope .

Formal identification has not yet been completed, but specially trained officers are supporting the boy’s next of kin.

Two children were taken to Bristol Royal Hospital for Children by air ambulance following the incident, while four other children and three adults remain in hospital in Somerset, a police spokesperson said.

The crash happened on the A396 at Cutcombe Hill, between Wheddon Cross and Timberscombe, at about 3.15pm on Thursday.

The vehicle left the road, overturned and came to rest about 20ft (six metres) from the roadway, down a steep slope.

An off-duty firefighter travelling behind the coach was able to start freeing passengers immediately.

Recovery of the vehicle and collision investigation are complex, and police expect the road to remain closed for a considerable time.

Minehead Middle School, which caters for pupils aged between nine and 14, and is five days away from the end of term, remained closed on Friday.

On Friday, a stream of people went to the school to pay respects, leaving floral tributes and messages at the gates. Dozens of bouquets, balloons and messages have been left at the school.

Many were visibly upset and could be seen hugging and supporting each other.

Speaking outside the school gates, the Rev Philip Butcher, the vicar of Minehead, said the community was in shock.

“It was absolutely numbing, there are no words to describe what happened yesterday,” he said.

“It’s an absolute tragedy, and one that’s still very much unfolding. We’re just standing firm with the school, with the families at this time, just to be with them in this time as a point of support.”

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said: “There are no adequate words to acknowledge the death of a child. All my thoughts are with their parents, family and friends, and all those affected.”

The driver of the coach is reported to be in a stable condition but has suffered “a number of injuries”.

In a statement, Chief Superintendent Mark Edgington said: “On behalf of the emergency services, I would like to thank the 24 volunteers from Exmoor Search and Rescue who carried out first aid triage at the rest centre and have rope and search skills.

“I also pass on thanks to the staff of the Rest and Be Thankful pub at Wheddon Cross, which opened its doors as the rest centre.

“Of course, we also recognise the efforts of Minehead Middle School, for keeping parents and carers informed and providing support to the school community during what is a difficult and distressing time for them all.”

Scheffler delivers ominous reminder to take charge at The Open 2025

It was a putt to send echoes around Royal Portrush, from all of 23ft for a precious par. Matt Fitzpatrick poured it in and avoided one final setback to show the contrasting nature of what an Open Championship test requires. Yet barely a few minutes later, the scale of the task for Fitzpatrick and the rest of the field became ominously clear.

Fitzpatrick is already a major champion, so he knows the merit of a shot-saver, as much as the spectacular strokes that lay the table before, notably those four consecutive birdies from 10-13 when he held a mesmeric control over that little white ball. But that putt only allowed him to cling onto the heels of Scottie Scheffler. A telling reminder of what he’ll need to trade blows with the world’s best player over the next 36 holes.

The soggy conditions around Royal Portrush saw Fitzpatrick emerge with a remarkable five-under-par round of 66 to sit at nine-under-par, bettered only by Scheffler at 10-under-par, as he pursues a second major to complement his US Open title. A feat that would cement his place, once again, in Luke Donald’s Team Europe for the Ryder Cup this September. Moreover, a second major title would catapult him into rare company. Multiple majors are just held in different esteem.

The Sheffield man has played some exquisite golf, leading the field in strokes gained tee-to-green. Yet there was a reminder of the minor blemishes that could prove costly over the weekend. Especially against Scheffler. Fitzpatrick’s remarkable round of golf could have been even better, but for the pesky seven-footer missed on 14 to squander a stroke. Then, a par, which felt like a bogey, on 17 after his enormous 362-yard drive. Then came a magnificent cross-handed chip, which has become synonymous with Fitzpatrick’s polished short game. It took a skid up the green before the brakes screeched. A simple birdie putt, surely, yet the two-footer wouldn’t drop.

It should be emphasised that Scheffler was not flawless, either. But he was pretty close. A wayward drive on 17 saw him forced into a jarring technique after good fortune to land on the wispy surface created by the hordes of spectators. Naturally, he carved out a shot to produce another birdie chance, with the ensuing 14-footer enough to eclipse Fitzpatrick.

That rare blemish off the tee for the three-time major champion highlighted how he can lean on a newfound weapon that could leave his rivals in the dust. The short stick is heating up after a puzzling week at the Scottish Open, where he lost 0.36 strokes gained putting. There, in a rare chance to relate to the best player in the world, Scheffler was left bewildered, remonstrating with his arms outstretched at a short miss. He had made just 33 per cent of his putts in the 10-20ft range. And his candid revelation over how golf fails to fulfil him further added to that vulnerability.

But through his first 25 holes this week, he cut a different figure, converting 100 per cent from that same range to produce a 1.58 strokes gained putting advantage. And after the relentless downpour, the course started to dry up and Scheffler’s trend fizzed once more in an imposing close to his seven-under-par round of 64, three better than his previous best at The Open (67, -4 in 2023). Calamity Corner? Not a bit of it, a second consecutive two arrived before that dagger on 17 ensured an outright lead.

“I definitely hit a few more fairways than yesterday, pretty proud of the number I produced,” Scheffler said, who is second in strokes gained putting this week. “I’m just seeing the breaks a little better, last week I thought it was a bit moundy on the greens, I saw a few double-breakers. Made sure this week I was lined up where I was lined up. You know, just putting.”

Before Scheffler’s run, a bunched leaderboard produced many heroes and villains. Enter Brian Harman, who relished his job in dampening the festival-like atmosphere two years ago, emerging from a Hoylake downpour to become the surprise Champion Golfer of the Year.

And the avid hunter, who sparked a furore in the British tabloids over his favourite pastime in 2023, conjured a blazing six-under-par round of 65 to sit just two behind his Team USA colleague. As did China’s Haotong Li, who even briefly stormed past Harman, only to fall back to eight-under-par.

While a disgruntled Shane Lowry made the cut, but the 2019 champion appeared to disagree with the verdict of organisers the R&A after being handed a two-shot penalty after his ball was adjudged to have moved while taking a practice swing on the 12th hole.

“I’m disappointed that they don’t have more camera angles on it,” said Lowry after accepting the penalty. “I told them I definitely was looking down towards the ball as I was taking that practice swing, and I didn’t see it move.”

Still the ultimate hero in Portrush, Rory McIlroy quickly banished any negativity from the overwhelming pressure felt from a nation behind him. Instead, McIlroy snapped back to the reality of two more rounds in front of his adoring Northern Irish fans after posting a 69 to sit tied-12th and seven behind Scheffler. It was a privilege not afforded to him back at the 2019 Open Championship, with that agonising missed cut.

“I don’t know if you can ever flow around here,” said McIlroy, who finished on three-under-par and six shots behind the lead. “This golf is very demanding. It’s quite visually intimidating off the tee. I’m excited for the opportunity. To play an extra two days in this atmosphere in front of these crowds. I feel like my game’s definitely good enough to make a run.”

The Open often distinguishes itself from the other three, US-based major championships, with the nuisance imposed by the elements. Yet its mature, informed fans, with 278,000 expected across the week, provide a home for characters far and wide.

Tyrrell Hatton is considered to be a tedious presence at the top of the game by some due to his fiery temper and petulant antics on the course. Yet Hatton, in a world of slick, risk-adverse sporting personalities, has never wavered from his blunt approach. A near miss at Oakmont, a US Open test many dismissed as a candidate for Hatton’s game, has only fuelled the fire for one of the more unique talents of the game. As others obsess over their ball flight’s curvature, Hatton’s majestic, straight-shooting approach saw him establish himself at the top of a major championship leaderboard once more: 68-69 enough for T-5 and a performance worthy of a treat.

“Be rude not to,” Hatton remarked when asked if he would repeat the trick of three pints of Guinness at a local pitch and putt with friends on Wednesday. “I think three is the magic number.”

Elsewhere, Robert MacIntyre is well placed to challenge at five-under-par. Now “a completely different golfer, physically and mentally”, six years on from finishing sixth here on his major debut in 2019, the Scot hopes to build on his second-place finish at the US Open this year.

While fellow Ryder Cup hopeful Rasmus Hojgaard is tucked in with MacIntyre at five-under-par, one ahead of his brother, Nicolai, who played for Team Europe at Marco Simone in 2023.

Tommy Fleetwood, highly fancied entering the week to go one better than his runner-up finish here six years ago, produced a brave response to a first-round of 72, rallying with a 69 to get back in the red at one-under-par overall.

Doctor concerned mother influenced daughter’s cancer treatment, inquest hears

An NHS doctor has told an inquest into the death of 23-year-old Paloma Shemirani – who died months after refusing treatment for cancer – that she was concerned her mother could have influenced the decision.

The Cambridge graduate refused chemotherapy after being diagnosed in December 2023, and died just seven months later in July – despite a doctor telling her she had an 80 per cent chance of survival if she underwent treatment.

Paloma’s brothers have spoken out publicly in recent weeks, accusing their mother Kate Shemirani of influencing Paloma into refusing treatment that could have saved her life.

Kate is a former nurse who was struck off in 2021 for sharing anti-vaxx misinformation during the Covid-19 pandemic. She has a large following across social media, where she shares anti-medicine conspiracy theories to millions of people online.

Arunodaya Mohan, a consultant haematologist at Maidstone Hospital told the inquest on Friday at Oakwood House in Maidstone, Kent, that Kate had raised concerns with experts about the treatment plan seven months before Paloma’s death.

Dr Mohan met Paloma on December 22 2023 to set out the treatment plan after her diagnosis. She told the inquest she recommended steroids and a PET (positron emission tomography) scan, adding that Paloma “nodded in agreement”.

But soon after that, Paloma told Ms Mohan that she had not made her mind up about the treatment and wished to explore other options.

Dr Mohan said that she spoke on the phone with Paloma’s mother, saying that she expressed “concerns” about the side-effects of steroids.

Dr Mohan told the inquest: “I didn’t want to discuss with mum because I didn’t think it would be helpful to her.”

Alison Hewitt, counsel to the inquest, later asked: “Were there concerns that Ms Shemirani was influencing Paloma?”

Dr Mohan replied: “That’s right.”

Paloma declined to have the treatment, and when Dr Mohan asked why, there did not seem to be a specific reason, the inquest heard.

Ms Hewitt asked Dr Mohan if she questioned Paloma on whether her decision was influenced by anyone.

Dr Mohan said: “She was very confident that it was her own decision and she was not influenced.”

Kate advocates for the use of “natural medicine” to cure diseases, and credits alternative therapies for being cancer free after she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2012, although her tumour was removed through surgery.

It is these kinds of conspiracy theories that Paloma’s brothers, Gabriel and Sebastian Shemirani, believe led their sister to refuse treatment for cancer.

Kate and her husband Faramarz Shemirani have denied responsibility and claimed that “Paloma died as a result of medical interventions” since her sons made the accusations, the BBC reported.

“My sister has passed away as a direct consequence of my mum’s actions and beliefs,” Paloma’s brother Sebastian told the BBC.

“And I don’t want anyone else to go through the same pain or loss that I have.”

Paloma began suffering chest pains after she graduated from the University of Cambridge and was later diagnosed with cancers after doctors found a mass in her lung.

She was told the cancer could be fatal if left untreated, but that she had an 80 per cent chance of recovery with treatment.

Her mother then spent two days with her as an inpatient at Maidstone Hospital, which Paloma’s boyfriend claimed could have influenced her decision to reject chemotherapy.

Her brother, Gabriel, then began a legal case arguing that Paloma should have an assessment of the appropriate medical treatment for her.

However, Paloma died before the case reached its conclusion in July 2024.

The Independent has approached Kate Shemirani for comment.

When my friends were facing cancer, a community of people stepped up

When I was younger, I used to worry incessantly about my parents getting cancer. I’d lay awake at night, ruminating on what would happen to my brother and I if they did. Who would support us? Thankfully, both are still cancer-free, well into their seventies.

However, now that I’m a parent myself, I worry about my children. Many people believe that cancer only really happens to people in old age, but that’s just not true. One beloved friend’s daughter died of leukaemia in 2020, aged just five; an unthinkable horror that changed the lives of everyone who knew her and her family.

And with Macmillan Cancer Support reporting that almost 3.5 million people in the UK are living with cancer, I also worry about my friends – parents themselves, their lives touched by cancer. One friend sat me down in our favourite local café, our toddlers playing at our feet, to break the news that she was about to undergo a double mastectomy. We cried together.

Another friend, Sarah, a single parent to two teenage girls, was diagnosed with breast cancer the day before we heard that King Charles had cancer, and a month before the Princess of Wales, Kate Middleton, announced her own diagnosis in March last year. It seemed like cancer was everywhere.

As a result, Sarah put 2024 on hold – she missed her daughter’s last sports day and last concert at primary school and had to find a whole new way of co-ordinating family life.

“I’m lucky in some ways that my children are teenagers, so they are able to look after themselves to some degree – but I’m also a single parent, so there are some things that they can’t do, or struggle with, due to their age,” she tells me.

“I have even set up multiple alarms on our Alexa reminding them to put their packed lunches in their bags or leave for school, just in case I can’t get up.”

Sarah says she thought she knew quite a lot about cancer prior to her diagnosis, but now admits she “really didn’t”. She explains: “There are so many terms and procedures to understand – stages and grades, not to mention over 100 different chemotherapy drugs.”

Sarah tells me about the exhausting cumulative effect of chemotherapy, which she endured every three weeks during her cancer treatment: “After the very first lot, I slept for a few hours and felt much better pretty quickly. For my last rounds, I slept for 48 hours solid and even days later, I needed to have a nap in the middle of the day and was in bed by 8pm.”

Sarah’s now finished chemotherapy and, a year on from her diagnosis, is turning 50. She’s throwing a huge party to celebrate not only the birthday milestone, but getting over this “annus horriblis” – a year she couldn’t have gotten through without the people around her.

“People can do so much for us when we are unwell – and I am forever grateful,” she says. “I’ve been really overwhelmed by the support that my friends have given me; from ferrying around my children to and from after-school events and sleepovers when things get bad, to my 75-year-old neighbour mowing the lawn. One friend popped round with a huge pot of pasta sauce and I even had a gift box from a recruiter at work.”

What talking to my strong, resilient friends about their cancer journeys has made me realise most, is the power of community: for when we receive the worst news imaginable, what we need is people around us to see us through. A community of other women: friends, school mums, neighbours.

They had people willing to make them food, pick up their children, go shopping for them or to just sit with them and listen. They had support when they decided to raise money for cancer support charities, when they did fundraisers such as hosting a Macmillan Coffee Morning.

It takes a village to raise a child – and that village will be with you every step of the way when you need them most.

Find out how you can help raise vital funds by hosting a Macmillan Coffee Morning. Sign up now on the Macmillan website

Macmillan Cancer Support, registered charity in England and Wales (261017), Scotland (SC039907) and the Isle of Man (604). Also operating in Northern Ireland.

Who will benefit the most from new rules about voter ID?

The announcement about giving the vote to 16- and 17-year-olds in all UK elections has obviously caused huge excitement, and some controversy. However, the experts say that the number of new voters will in practice be very small, and that it will make only a marginal difference to the result of a general election – because some won’t vote, and there’s no God-given law about them all voting Labour.

Much more significant are the new rules on voter ID. The range of acceptable documents will be widened to include, for example, bank cards. Whatever the advantage it might bestow on any particular party at an election, proponents say it will boost turnout, and engagement with the democratic process…

The government says its elections bill will allow people to use UK-issued bank cards as proof of identity, and of course, these do not usually carry an image of the user. In addition, there will be “more digital options to support voters and polling station staff, including allowing accepted IDs such as the Veteran Card and UK driving licence to be used at polling stations when they become available in digital format”.

The cynics say it is because it will benefit Labour disproportionately. Others say that, true or not, that’s less important than allowing people to vote, and that the threat of electoral fraud has been greatly exaggerated.

Historically, according to the Electoral Commission and the academics, there’s been little in Great Britain even in local elections, and it is virtually unknown in general elections. Where it has cropped up, such as in Tower Hamlets, it has been dealt with.

The counterclaim is that photo ID was brought in by the Conservatives in the last parliament in order to help them and to suppress the Labour vote. A point lost to history is that the 2019 Conservative manifesto did not specify “photo” ID as the preferred option. (Northern Ireland has needed photo ID for far longer, because of much more voter “personation”. Hence the local slogan “Vote early, vote often”.)

Probably in the hundreds of thousands, and maybe more. The polling company More in Common say that, on the basis of polling after the last election, more than 850,000 would have been turned away at the polling station for lack of ID, and – given that some returned – perhaps 400,000 lost their vote.

It affected voters from ethnic minority groups disproportionately: the poll suggested that 6.5 per cent of voters of colour were turned away from a polling booth at least once, compared with 2.5 per cent of white voters.

But of course, no one really has any idea how many voters didn’t even bother to go to the polls who wished to, because they knew they didn’t have the necessary ID – or they did but it had some minor discrepancy, such as a variation in their first name or the precise spelling of their surname.

Local council “greeters” posted outside polling stations may also have stopped people from entering the premises, and thus these would-be voters would have gone unnoticed by the local election officials or the Electoral Commission.

The government says that an increasingly automated voter registration system will also make it easier for people to register to vote, and will reduce the need for them to fill out their details across different government services on multiple occasions.

On balance, Labour, because of its relatively high vote among some ethnic minorities; but also, for that same reason, the Corbynite independents who took seats from Labour in strongly Muslim areas even in a strong year such as 2024. Reform UK might also see some benefit, because their vote is skewed towards more disadvantaged places, where turnouts are traditionally low. Automated registration among disaffected non-voters might give them a bit of a boost.

No. As with votes at 16, the numbers aren’t going to make that much of a difference, and in our present confused four- or five-party system, it’s hard to see anyone gaining a decisive advantage. And voting allegiances by age, class and ethnicity, for example, can shift over time anyway. But in a very close contest, who knows?

This seems to be another problem for turnout. The government says of last July: “Overall, 8 per cent of non-voters mentioned they did not vote because of an issue related to their postal vote (such as missing the deadline to apply, forms arriving late and forgetting to send their postal vote) – with this figure rising to 13 per cent in Scotland and Wales.”

The deterioration in the postal system has added fresh challenges to a method of voting many find essential, or more convenient. So the proposal is to change the deadline in Great Britain to apply for a postal vote, moving it from 11 to 14 working days before a poll, thereby providing more time between the application deadline and polling day.

This only became much of an issue in Britain after the contested 2020 US presidential election, and Donald Trump’s unfounded allegations that it was rigged. Nigel Farage and Reform UK make a big deal of it, and Richard Tice, Reform’s deputy leader, has raised it again in the Commons this week, stating: “I have seen people carrying bag-loads of postal votes to a polling station on election day.” The relevant minister, Rushanara Ali, told him to tell the police.

Our failing water firms are a damning reflection of Broken Britain

The latest report from the Environment Agency on the state of Britain’s rivers is a veritable shower of euphemism and shame. “Serious pollution incidents”, the bland bureaucratic term preferred by the agency, are up by 60 per cent just in the last year.

We all know what that means: lumpy sewage in streams and on seashores that turns the stomach of anyone nearby, asphyxiates fish, and generally decimates the environment. “Wastewater” leaking out while being carried uphill is apparently a particular problem, one “impacting” swimmers.

Around 80 per cent of the most serious “incidents” were down to three companies – Thames Water (33 spillages), Southern Water (15) and Yorkshire Water (13).

There is no suggestion that the situation is likely to improve; indeed, all the talk is of Thames Water, the largest company of its kind in the country, collapsing under the weight of its own debt rather than its scandalous record on pollution.

It’s a damning reflection of “Broken Britain”. Why has a supposedly civilised G7 economy grown so easily accustomed to such an appalling state of affairs? It may be true that de-industrialisation has cleaned up some of the larger rivers and estuaries in recent decades, but the water companies, the regulators and successive governments can hardly take credit for that.

What they are responsible for is what is in their control – maintaining a sewage system that does what it is expected of it in the modern world. It is one of the most basic services – and yet in parts of the UK, it feels little more than a hopeless aspiration.

This river of excrement has been rolling for years, and, while the details can be complex, the principal streams of blame that feed into the scandal can be easily identified. Incomprehensibly weak regulation is the strongest of the currents, either because Ofwat was never given sufficient powers or a wide enough remit, or because it was incompetent, or all three.

There has never been a shortage of official bodies nominally overseeing matters – the Environment Agency and various iterations of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, as well as local authorities – but always a huge deficit of effective democratic control.

There is, of course, a fundamental contradiction at the heart of this particular privatised industry: the provision of clean running water and efficient sewage disposal may not align with the commercial imperatives of the companies denationalised in 1989 in England and Wales (Scotland and Northern Ireland were spared the experiment). Profit and public service can co-exist and even flourish – but not always, and not everywhere.

Even if the industry had been regulated better, the privatised model combined with zero competition and regulated tariffs was poorly prepared for the task of investing the vast sums needed to renew the crumbling Victorian infrastructure, let alone build the reservoirs and pipework required to cater for a population that was to expand by some 12 million in the ensuing decades. Some public services ought not to be expected, let alone forced, to turn a profit.

But from early on, the major weakness in the regulatory regime was becoming apparent – that while the need to monitor charges and water quality was recognised, there was no oversight of the financial health of the companies.

Once the shares had been acquired from the small shareholders in the initial public offerings and placed in the hands of private equity firms, the companies were free to load themselves with as much debt as they fancied – which paid for bumper dividends for the new shareholders. It left a vital public service hopelessly over-mortgaged.

The chance was taken for some lucrative asset stripping, even certain reservoirs were sold off, and the companies were left so enfeebled that if Ofwat tried to fine them, they could plausibly claim that they would go bust. They contrived to make themselves too big to fail. Or so they hoped.

On Monday, the government will publish a review of the industry by Sir Jon Cunliffe, the head of the Independent Water Commission, and its own proposals will follow. As we reported on Friday, the government is expected to scrap Ofwat. It must use the power of parliament to chart a new course for the industry.

Despite the pollution crisis, the Treasury cannot afford immediately to renationalise the most distressed of the operators, Thames Water, because of its enormous debts – more than £16bn.

It seems inevitable that Thames will fall into the special procedure that will ensure continuing water and sewage services to 15 million customers in southern England and London while the government takes control.

This is a far cheaper remedy for the taxpayer, but it does still mean that the considerable cost of cleaning up the rivers, keeping the taps on and the loos flushing will, to some extent, fall to the taxpayers as well as the bill payers. Either that, or we just get used to having the dirtiest rivers and beaches in Europe.