The inflation-busting leap came despite Thames Water being fined for missing pollution targets, average bills soaring by nearly a third last year, and customer complaints rocketing 77%
The fatcat boss of crisis hit Thames Water insisted he “deserved” a pay rise to almost £1million despite the debt-drenched firm facing a possible taxpayer rescue.
The company’s annual report revealed Chris Weston’s annual salary surged from an already bumper £869,000 to £995,000 from April 1.
The inflation-busting leap came despite Thames Water being fined for missing pollution targets, average bills soaring by nearly a third last year, and customer complaints rocketing 77%.
Yet asked about his pay rise, Mr Weston said: “(The board) offered it to me. I accepted. I absolutely think the pay rise is deserved.”
The former British Gas bigwig went on: “At Thames, we have to attract the right quality of talent and experience to be able to run and lead a company in an extremely difficult situation.”
Mr Weston’s more than £1million pay and perks package for last year included more than £100,000 towards his pension, plus a car allowance of £15,000 and private medical insurance of almost £2,600. He also received £57,244 for unused annual leave. The 62-year-old was previously filmed watching cricket during a BBC documentary.
The chief executive also bagged a more than £99,000 bonus despite a ban on rewards being paid if water companies miss environmental targets. Thames annual report said the windfall dated back to a scheme from 2023/24.
However, Environment Secretary Emma Reynolds said: “It’s outrageous that one of the worst performing water companies is handing out bonuses and inflation busting pay rises to executives. It flies in the face of basic fairness, the British public are right to be furious. We’ve banned bonuses for polluting water bosses and will be taking action to prevent bonuses by any other name.”
It came as Thames Water revealed it only has enough funds to survive until the end of this year as it debt mountain ballooned from £17.7billion to nearly £20billiom. On the plus side, it swung from a £1.65billion loss to a £226.4million profit.
Britain’s biggest water company is battling to secure a rescue deal with its creditors.
However, Ms Reynolds warned last month she did not believe the plan to relieve the stricken utility goes far enough to protect customers or the environment.
PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham has also suggested Thames Water should be nationalised.
Thames Chairman Sir Adrian Montague insisted: “We remain of the view that a market-led solution is the fastest route to delivering improvements in customer service, environmental performance and long-term resilience, and we continue to progress on that basis.”
However, he admitted “the process has taken far longer than any of us had anticipated”.
Sir Adrian added: “With a new Prime Minister and Cabinet in prospect, we will seek to pursue a speedy dialogue to resolve current uncertainties.”
Thames, supplies 2.6 billion litres of water every day to 16 million customers, had 122,798 complaints last year, up 77%, Billing complaint doubled to almost 96,300, while metering complaints surged by 126%.
The company recorded 386 pollution incidents in 2025, down 18% reduction on the 470 in 2024, and its serious pollution incidents fell by 27%, from 33 to 24. Despite that, it missed regulatory targets for both,.
Thames insisted, despite the parlous state of its finances, it could survive for another 12 months but admitted there was “material uncertainty” over its long term future.
Lib Dem Environment Spokesperson Tim Farron said: “Thames Water is failing, and balancing its books on the backs of hard-pressed bill payers – all while paying huge amounts of interest and continuing to dump toxic sewage into our precious waterways.
“The whole system is fundamentally broken. If Andy Burnham wants to prove he is serious about cleaning up our broken water industry, he needs to heed Liberal Democrat calls to immediately place Thames Water into a Special Administration Regime, and transform it into a mutual that is owned by and serves its customers and the environment, not vulture capital funds.”
