Jeremy Hunt attempts to draw general election dividing line between the Conservatives and Labour over tax

The chancellor has described as a “red herring” the notion that privatisation is the root cause of water quality problems in England. Asked “People in the southwest are drinking unsafe water. We’ve seen sewage pumped into seas and lakes and rivers. Do you accept that your party has failed to ensure that the public have a clean safe water system?”, Hunt replied: I have the misfortune to represent constituents who have been treated badly by Thames Water and I’m very familiar with these problems.

What I would say is that, again, the difficult decision we are taking as a government is to require water companies to invest more in their network than they have ever done before. In fact, nearly £100bn pounds of operating expenditure predicted for the next five years. And the only company that has more leaks than Thames Water, which represents my constituency, is Scottish water, which was not privatised. So, to talk about this as a privatisation issue is a red herring.

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