CCW publishes PR24 manifesto

CCW has set out its manifesto for PR24, through which it aims to “give consumers a powerful voice at every stage of the price review process” and address water decision making that is “still heavily weighted in favour of the water companies and regulators”.

The watchdog identified five priorities:

1. centralised, collaborative research for a consistent approach that will allow easier comparison of results;

2. supporting and assuring local challenge. CCW said it could use its own insights and data to this end; that it is "pushing for Ofwat to incentivise the sharing of good practice at PR24”; and that the benchmarking role of its Central Oversight Group model should be incorporated into the PR24 governance framework;

3. delivering high-quality customer engagement – drawing on its Framework for Engagement at PR24 recommendations;

4. fast-tracking company business plans taking account of whether they have delivered the promises they previously made to customers; and demonstrated the sharing of good practice on customer engagement and any service delivery innovation with the rest of the sector; and

5. making clear how customers influence decisions – including how Ofwat takes account of customer views in final determinations; how customers influence trade-off decisions that are made as business plans are finalised (it said its Expert Consumer Panel idea could be a way of doing this); and by clearly setting out the areas of business planning where Ofwat will expect to see evidence of customers’ views.