Speeches by Gardiner.

“So you did not choose KKR because it could bully the Treasury. Did you choose KKR because it committed to giving the senior debtholders less of a haircut?”

“But they did, did they not?”

“Investors would normally want to see the board structure as well as the investment structure of the company, but you have said that the entire board will step down as soon as the new investment goes in. Is that because the Court of Appeal removed immunity from Thames directors against any claims a future special admini…”

“Why was it?”

“Why have you said that the whole board would step down? Because when you were answering my colleague, you said that you could not give an assurance that they would stay in place, but you did not say, “I can give you an assurance that they will not be in place over the next five years because we have already said that w…”

“Why did you not say that to my colleague?”

“Just before we do, Mr Weston, you said that you had seen no evidence that you could have sourced additional funding on better terms from anywhere else. I believe you received an offer in early September from one of the groups that eventually put a bid in of £1 billion, which was on better terms, was it not?”

“Do you know the one I am referring to?”

“The Class A bondholders argued that there was insufficient time to implement an alternative restructuring plan, if the A plan could not be implemented. The Court of Appeal described the enormous time pressure of the case as unacceptable, and requests to expedite the appeal proceedings as, “Frankly, ridiculous”. To what…”

“But it did say that the plan you were putting up was unacceptable. Were you intentionally trying to—”

“What impact would a SAR have on Thames Water’s operations and on the senior staff?”

“Let me give you another way of looking at that. What you have outlined is that, “Look, Ofwat, if you decide that we do not have to pay these penalties, then we can work our way to becoming the company that you have outlined you want us to be.” What about you saying to Ofwat, “Look, Ofwat, give us the capacity to raise …”

“Would not allow.”

“It does not allow you to get out of doing the penalties either. So if Thames Water is going to become a viable and investable proposition, you have to sort it out one way or the other. You either have to stop doing the things that are incurring the penalties, which are making your cost of capital so much higher, or you…”

“One last thing, Sir Adrian: was that not the reason that Thames withdrew from the CMA process? There is no way that the CMA could agree to what we have just outlined, given that it has to operate fairly between all the water companies and it could not argue for the special position that you believe is necessary. Why di…”

“That is what you denied before when I asked you about KKR saying that they could bully the Treasury into bullying Ofwat.”

“I am delighted to speak in support of the Committee’s report, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Chair of the Select Committee on the way in which he has led the Committee and on how he took up the remnant of this report from the last Parliament as the first report for our Committee in the new Parliament. He is righ…”

“Yesterday I spoke with colleagues in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs about the progress of the treaty on biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction—sometimes known as the global ocean treaty. I was assured that, as far as the Department is concerned, the matter had been dealt with and was all done…”

“It dies off.”

“Thank you. I want to put one more question—this may touch on what you were saying, Mr Spearing—about early intervention being required here. You may be aware of a report that was commissioned by Wild Justice, which was carried out in the summer of last year, looking at 42 new developments across five local planning aut…”