Thames Water boss admits staff are 'uncooperative' over Cookham sewage station questions

A Thames Water boss has said his colleagues’ lack of cooperation over questions about a sewage site in Cookham is like ‘banging my head against a wall’.

Problems at the company’s Lightlands Lane pumping station were thrust into the spotlight during 2024’s major flooding, when it became submerged underwater.

Residents and councillors have since called for action to ensure no repeat of the issues that year, which saw sewage pollution leak into people’s homes.

Thames Water’s Home Counties stakeholder manager David Harding told a flood liaison group meeting on Tuesday (June 1) that company staff had been ‘uncooperative’ to questions.

“I’m just struggling to get colleagues to engage really on it because they feel it’s kind of a deckchairs on the Titanic situation,” Mr Harding said.

“Because when such a large area goes underwater, there’s just so many points of ingress to the sewerage system.”

Mr Harding was responding to questions from Dick Scarff of the Cookham Society and Cookham councillor Mark Howard (Lib Dem) about the flood resilience of Lightlands Lane.

Thames Water had submitted a written response to a question submitted prior to the meeting, which said there had been delays in raising electrics at the pumping station above water level.

But, when Mr Scarff asked what was being done to shore up a perimeter boundary around the site, Mr Harding said he had been unable to get answers from staff.

He said: “Whenever I go to the teams that manage the assets, they’re quite, sort of, uncooperative because they feel that they’ve answered every question that there is about Lightlands Lane.”

He said: “I’m just banging my head against a wall, they just won’t engage.

“Because, as I say, it’s a foul drainage system. It’s not designed to work underwater. It’s not designed as a fluvial flood defence.

“If significant parts of the network are underwater, they say it ceases to function and they won’t give any more information than that.”

He said an environmental information request (EIR), similar to a freedom of information request, could be submitted to Thames Water to get the details.

Mr Harding had suggested that several other issues raised in the meeting involving Thames Water’s infrastructure could be resolved through an EIR.

Cllr Richard Coe (Riverside, Lib Dem), council cabinet member for household and regulatory services, said the liaison group could speak to Maidenhead MP Josh Reynolds.

Mr Reynolds could then raise the matter with appropriate ministers in Parliament, he said.

Meeting chair Cllr David Buckley (Reform UK, Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury) said: “I think the point we need to take forward, what Richard said, is to take it up with the local MP and take it further there.

“Because obviously, David, in particular, you’re getting brick-walled on this and we’re not going to go any further.

“So, it has to go up a level.”

Mr Harding said: “I can ask the question one last time and say that if they don’t answer, that will be your next step.”