Campaigners have raised concerns over a potential conflict of interest for the new UK environment secretary, Steve Barclay, whose wife is a senior executive at Anglian Water. Barclay took on the environment role in Rishi Sunak’s cabinet reshuffle this week. His wife, Karen Barclay, holds a senior position at the water company, as head of major infrastructure (DCO) planning and stakeholder engagement. As secretary of state, Barclay is responsible for overseeing the regulation of water companies. He is responsible for ensuring the water firms make improvements regarding sewage pollution via the government’s storm overflow reduction plan. Anglian Water is one of six companies under investigation by the regulator Ofwat for potential illegal dumping of raw sewage. The Environment Agency is separately in the middle of a huge criminal investigation into illegal sewage dumping by water companies involving more than 2000 water treatment works.
Water companies are pressing government and the regulator Ofwat to approve £96bn investment in infrastructure improvements to fix leaks, stop sewage discharges and build more capacity at treatment plants, which they want customers to pay for via bill rises. Many critics say the public has already paid once for the investment, and should not be made to pay again for fixing problems which put the companies in breach of their legal duties. Tim Farron, the rural spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, said: “Ministers’ spouses do of course have the right to their own careers, but I do worry about the possible conflict of interest here for the man charged with forcing the water companies to clean up their act. “We need to make sure the secretary of state is fully committed to doing everything in his power to stop the sewage scandal.” This summer, Anglian Water pleaded guilty to allowing millions of litres of untreated sewage to overflow from a water recycling centre in Essex. It was fined £2.65m, the largest penalty imposed for environmental offences in the east of England region. Ashley Smith, of Windrush Against Sewage Pollution, said there was a possible conflict of interest for the new secretary of state. “It’s not just that the new environment secretary’s wife holds a senior post at Anglian Water, it is the fact that the water industry routinely operates outside the law, has misappropriated billions of bill payers’ money and now holds the country to ransom to hike bills to fix the mess it made and cannot be trusted to not make off with another windfall gifted by government,” said Smith. A government spokesperson said: “All Defra ministers declare their interests in line with the ministerial code. “There is an established regime in place for the declaration and management of interests held by ministers. This ensures that steps are taken to avoid or mitigate any potential or perceived conflicts of interest.” Craig Bennett, the chief executive of the Wildlife Trusts, who chairs Anglian Water’s independent challenge board, said: “It would prudent for him to make sure this has been declared publicly and that it is all out in the open. Then it is something that can be managed.” Karen Barclay has been approached for a comment. Anglian Water did not comment. • The image on this article was replaced on 14 November 2023. An earlier image was incorrectly captioned as showing Steve Barclay with his wife.