South East Water boss urged to face MPs to explain crisis

South East Water (SEW) boss David Hinton has been asked by the chairperson of the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs Committee (Efra) to explain the water disruption which affected 24,000 properties in parts of Kent and East Sussex for more than a week.

Customers in the Tunbridge Wells area started to experience a lack of water pressure on 29 November after problems at the Pembury Water Treatment Works resulted in the site shutting down.

Efra said in a statement a public evidence session was due to take place on 6 January and Mr Hinton was invited to attend.

A SEW spokesperson said the company would "fully comply with Efra committee's request for information" and confirmed Mr Hinton would attend.

Efra chairperson Alistair Carmichael MP wrote to Mr Hinton on Wednesday, setting out "significant concerns" about the water crisis.

In the letter, Mr Carmichael criticised the company's "substandard crisis management plan".

He also highlighted his concerns which included SEW's choice of bottled water distribution sites and crisis communications.

He also wrote that "lessons had not been learnt from recent large-scale outages".

Following days without any water for many customers, SEW issued a boiled water notice on Wednesday.

In the company's latest update on Tuesday, incident manager Matthew Dean said the notice remained "in place until further notice" due to the water quality issues that led to the initial shutdown of the treatment plant.

SEW had initially said the notice would be in force for 10 days.

"We are very sorry for the impact this situation has had, and continues to have," Mr Dean said

He said SEW was "testing the water regularly", adding water "remained "chemically safe" and contained "no bacterial contaminants".

SEW said the water could be used for flushing toilets or showering, but crucially could not be used for drinking, cooking or washing up without boiling and letting it cool first.

Mr Dean added there had been "a lot of misinformation spreading on social media with regards to the boil notice".

He urged residents to visit the company's website for information regarding the notice.

"Our head of water quality, Neil Hudson, has answered the top five most frequently asked questions in this video," Mr Dean added.

According to SEW, supplies had been restored to all the affected properties on Sunday.

SEW says bottled water stations are open until 22:00 BST in:

• Tunbridge Wells Sports Centre, St John's Rd, Royal Tunbridge Wells, TN4 9TX

• Odeon car park, Knights Way, TN2 3UW

• B&M Store with Garden Centre, Linden Park Road, Kent TN2 5QL

The company has also published a full list of postcodes affected by the boil notice on its website.

The company's handling of the crisis has prompted Liberal Democrat MP for Tunbridge Wells, Mike Martin, to call for the resignation of Mr Hinton.

Mr Martin also proposed a "Covid-style" compensation scheme for businesses which said they had lost "thousands" due to the disruption.

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