Water Enforcement
Preventing pollution and holding polluters to account
Our goal is not simply to prosecute pollution after it happens. We want to prevent pollution before it starts. That's why we've assembled our largest ever water enforcement workforce, growing from 41 specialist roles in 2023 to 184 in 2026. We've increased inspections, strengthened our intelligence capability and expanded the range of enforcement tools available to us.
Over the past year alone, we carried out more than 10,000 inspections of water company assets, identifying around 3,000 actions requiring improvement. Every inspection, investigation and enforcement action helps drive changes that protect rivers, lakes, coastal waters, wildlife and communities. Water pollution is unacceptable. The Environment Agency is taking stronger action than ever before to hold polluters to account, prevent environmental harm and drive lasting improvements across the water industry.
This page explains what enforcement action we're taking, recent outcomes, and how our work is helping protect the future of our water environment.
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Protecting Rivers, Lakes and Coastal Waters
Everything we do is guided by four principles:
- Greater transparency through better monitoring and more publicly available information.
- Stronger accountability so water companies and other operators take responsibility for their environmental performance.
- Faster consequences through a wider range of enforcement powers when environmental laws are broken.
- Preventing pollution by tackling problems at their source rather than simply responding after incidents occur.
In recent years we have significantly strengthened our regulatory and enforcement capability, with more officers, better data and stronger legal powers. This allows us to identify breaches sooner, investigate more effectively and take decisive action where standards are not met.
Water enforcement at a glance
- More than 10,000 inspections carried out on water company assets in 2025 to 2026, identifying around 3,000 improvement actions.
- 184 specialist enforcement roles
- More than 70 successful prosecutions against water and sewerage companies since 2015, resulting in over £158 million in fines.
- £8.5 million in enforcement undertakings secured in the last year
- By 2030, more than 3,500 sites will benefit from continuous water quality monitoring, rising to around 14,500 by 2035.
- £3.3 billion to be invested in nature-based solutions including wetlands, river restoration and sustainable drainage between 2025 and 2030.
Enforcement is more than prosecutions
When people hear the term enforcement, they often think about prosecutions and court cases.
Prosecution is an important part of our work, particularly for serious environmental offences, but it is only one part of a much wider enforcement approach. We use a wide range of powers and interventions to prevent pollution, drive improvements and hold companies to account. The action we take depends on the evidence, environmental impact and seriousness of the issue identified.
Find out more below:
From intelligence to improvement
Our enforcement process begins long before court action. Through inspections, monitoring and investigations, we identify non-compliance, take proportionate enforcement action where needed, and work with businesses and communities to secure lasting environmental improvements and prevent future pollution.