Andy Burnham has committed to keeping water bills down, and he is fast approaching the point where he must act, now that he is prime minister. On Thursday, he accused water companies of treating their customers “as a bottomless source of funding” for the industry’s failings, after proposals that will push household bills even higher were approved.
Water bills to rise
Millions of households in England and Wales will face higher bills after water companies were given the green light to spend £3.4bn more than planned, including to support new homes and datacentres.
Water customers are not a ‘blank cheque’, Burnham warns suppliers.
UK GDP growth slows
The big UK economic news of the day was the 0.4% GDP growth in the second quarter. The Guardian’s economics editor, Heather Stewart, writes: “Economic growth slowed in the second quarter of the year, as the disruption unleashed by the Iran war began to take its toll, official figures show. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said GDP expanded by 0.4% in the three months to June, down from 0.6% in the first quarter, in line with City economists’ expectations.”
While it marked a slowdown, analysts said the data suggested the UK economy had been more resilient in the face of the ongoing Middle East conflict than feared. Yael Selfin, the chief economist at KPMG, said: “Consumers have faced a series of shocks since the start of the year but have weathered them remarkably well.” However, she warned the second half of the year was likely to be weaker. “The UK economy closed out the first half of the year on strong footing, but momentum is likely to fade over the coming months,” she said.
Frasers Group acquires Harvey Nichols
In the fashion world, Mike Ashley has expanded his empire yet again. This time it is the Harvey Nichols department store chain that his Frasers Group will take over.
He has said he would keep Harvey Nichols’s Knightsbridge and Edinburgh stores, but rebrand the four other stores – in Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester and Bristol – as House of Fraser or Flannels, writes retail correspondent Sarah Butler. Harvey Nichols, which was founded in 1831 as a linen shop and became the flag-bearer for 1990s chic, was put up for sale by its long-term owner Dickson Poon after failing to make a profit since the coronavirus pandemic locked out big-spending foreign tourists.
