Good morning, and welcome to the Severn Trent 2021, 2022 half year results Q&A session. Hopefully you've had chance already to view the presentation and see some of the links to the videos, which worked well. In the room, you see James on camera now, but actually we've got the whole senior management team. Feel free to ask any question you wish, 'cause we've got the whole presence of our senior management team with us today.
Now, in terms of how do you ask a question, you might be thinking, "Remind me, Liv, how do I do it?" You go to the reactions button, which is the bottom right-hand corner of your screen right now, and then you click on the Raise Hand option, and that will then allow you to either ask a question live, so we'll come to you during the course of it, or you can also decide to ask the question online. That's how it works. I'll hopefully see some questions begin to come through. In the meantime, I've got one that has come through here, and one, James, it's for you. It says: Walk me through your reaction and feelings on inflation?
I think the key takeaway on inflation is that it's positive for water companies, but it's particularly positive for Severn Trent, and that's because when you look at the overall model, we have less than 30% of our debt that's index-linked. There'll be lots of focus on our interest line at the half year. Actually, you know, a lot of that is around timing. Keep in mind that every 1% that you see of inflation, you may see an impact on our interest cost line, but 1% additional inflation means an extra GBP 95 million of RCV growth.
Then when we think about next year, the impact on revenue, that 1% of additional inflation is worth around GBP 14 million of additional revenue next year, and it's the November CPIH number that is taken into account for revenue. Based on current projections of where we think CPIH might be for this month, we're looking at an extra GBP 55 million of revenue next year just as a result of that higher inflation in this month. There is some timing going on. When it comes to actual costs, I feel very confident that the team here at Severn Trent can manage those costs effectively.
On energy, there's quite a few moving parts, but the key takeaway is that on energy, we have a very effective 50% self-generation hedge, which means that even seeing the very high wholesale prices that we've seen this year, which are feeding into that inflation number, actually the impact on our RoRE is neutral. We're talking sort of, you know, low single digit basis points on RoRE because of that natural hedge. On capital, my colleague, Helen, has got a lot of our activity already contracted in, so we feel in good shape to manage inflation on our capital base. Of course, as I said in the results in my presentation, for labor, we have a 2.3% pay deal, and we're in year two of that three-year deal.
I feel very confident that the team can manage our costs at below inflation, and the result of that is good news to come through in RCV and revenue as that inflation flows through into future years.
Very good. Right. We're gonna go to our first live question now. Mark, it is yourself. So we've got a nice Credit Suisse banner in the top corner. Over to yourself.
Thank you. Can I ask you a question, please, Liv, just on flow to full treatment, Environment Agency conditions. I mean, as I understand it, you know, Ofwat and some of the other regulators have become suspicious that the industry is not reporting everything. How confident are you that your business has been reporting all the various overflows, and yeah, how confident are you?
Brilliant. Thank you very much. You would have seen that we've welcomed, quite openly, the investigation this morning. Regulators have got a critical role in our sector. If ever they feel that there is an issue in the sector, it's a sector-wide investigation, as you said, then quite rightly, they've got to call that out, and they've got to investigate it. We welcome scrutiny. We're perfectly comfortable. That's what we want regulators to be. We say openly that strong regulators make for a strong sector. We've got a strong track record of being very open and transparent with all of our data, and as such, we'll be submitting our data pretty promptly over the course of the next few days, the first wave of data into Ofwat and EA.
We've been in active dialogue on all parts of our business, you know, throughout this price review and the last. Feel comfortable that they are opening the investigation and feel comfortable submitting our data as promptly as possible to allow them to peruse it and then move forward. Don't have any idea on timelines, I'm afraid, if you're gonna ask that question. The first thing and the only thing we can do at this stage is to supply all the data they've asked for and allow them then to crack on with their analysis.
Okay. Thank you. Just a follow-up question for James, just on the energy hedging in self-generation, and that may rise over time. You mentioned on the video that you've accelerated some of the hedging earlier this year on the 50% that's not self-generation. How far have you done that hedging, and how does it compare to what was in the FD?
Yeah, it's good. For the rest of this year, we're hedged out to around 97% of our energy prices. We've got a few hedges that extend out into future years. The key thing to keep in mind is unlike a lot of other companies, the level of self-generation that we have provides a very effective economic hedge. What I'm focused on is that impact on RoRE. I feel very comfortable that as a group, across our regulated and our non-regulated business, we're in the right place to manage wholesale prices as they go up and down, you know, over the next few months.
Typically, we've outperformed against the FD when you look at our-
Yeah. We have.
Historic performance on energy, and I guess we'll be looking to do the same this time around, right?
Exactly, yeah.
I guess we won't give any more guidance than that in terms of that, but that's been our strong track record for the past and hopefully the future.
No hedging for 20-year ended March 2023 above the 50% self-generation.
That's not what I said. What I said is that for the remainder of this year, we've got hedging that covers it 100%. As we go out into future years, there will be some hedging. It won't be 100%. But you know, we typically focus on that economic hedging, which gives us an effective 100% hedge when you take into account the cost sharing across the price controls, and that's the key point for investors.
Thank you.
Right. I'm gonna move to Dom now. I think you sneakily got in with three questions there. Nicely played, Mark. We're gonna move to Dom now and see what questions he's offered.
Thank you very much. Can you hear me okay?
can hear you beautifully.
Oh, fantastic. A couple of questions for me then, please. Firstly, going back to your first point on inflation. Can you just talk through exactly how the financing outperformance will work and flow through, and what sort of cost sharing, financing sharing that you're gonna have to do with consumers as the high inflation comes through the high allowed nominal cost of debt versus your book. Secondly, on the ODI numbers, you obviously increased those this time around, which is good. I think a couple of weeks ago, Ofwat pretty much said that, I think GBP 45 million of ODIs from the previous review are being deferred.
Do you think this GBP 75 million is likely to be permanently deferred, and do you think we'll start to see that added to the RCV will come through in revenues in future years? Sort of obviously just wanna follow up from Mark's question on the Ofwat investigation. Do you think you have been misreporting your outflows? Thank you.
Let's go through all three of those. We'll do ODIs, which I'm gonna start off with, and then I'll also hand to Shane just to cover off because it links his charges. I'll pick up the Ofwat question, and then I'll get James to do the inflation question. In principle, the way that it's at a high level, earning more ODIs obviously is a great success story because it means that our measures our customers care about most, we're improving our performance against it. Actually, I think what was pleasing for us about the Ofwat report recently is it ratified all of our performance in terms of the first year of the AMP.
Now, 'cause obviously you've got new measures, you've got a new AMP, and that first year is to really work with them and just, I guess, fully submit all the data and all the evidence, and then to conclude and move forward. Certainly for other people, there were some changes for us. It was a really strong performance that Ofwat recognized, our strong performance in that first year, and that gives us confidence pushing forward for the remainder of the AMP against those measures. We choose actually how we take the revenues. We've chosen to defer that number, and that's because we don't want bill shock. I'll let Shane talk you through it.
Yeah, that's right. We're not permanently deferring the ODIs. We just have a number of different components this year. Inflation, the RFI adjustment, Green Recovery and K-factor. Next year, after we set next year's charge, the RFI will drop out, so it will create more headroom to take some of the ODIs. It's not a permanent deferral. It's just managing the bill impacts as we did last time, because we're one of only three companies to do that. We'll just be looking to manage that again this AMP.
One of the things we've said is that in an ideal world, and you'd never know if you've got an ideal world, but in an ideal world, you would be able to create a bit of a war chest to carry over into the next AMP. Actually, that for us is what we've consistently said. When we look at our success of going from AMP6 to AMP7 and being confident in our long-term, you know, progressive growing dividend policy, having the war chest of ODIs meant that even though the WACC was particularly low this time around, we're able to shield ourselves. It was a really tight price control. I mean, PR19 is a very, very tough price control to deliver successfully against. Having that war chest of ODIs certainly shields us. It does and gives us more confidence.
You know, to be fair, if we're able to deliver strongly now, if our inflation numbers are good, if things are good across the piece for this AMP, then being able to carry that war chest over into the next AMP of some of those ODIs will be part of our long-term strategy. We've always been open that we would see that as positive. We'd be confident to take some in period and some not to put it as a necessary as a balance sheet adjustment, but actually to carry over as revenue into the next price control. Don't forget, they come 2 years in advance. Anything you earn in years four and five, you have to carry over into the next AMP anyway because that's just the nature of how it works.
They're adjusted for inflation and time value of money as well. We're not missing out on that.
Very good. I think we've covered that in full detail. Going to the second one. I mean, which was your question about the Ofwat investigation. I think the question you're asking is, do I feel confident that we've consistently shared good, transparent, open data with the regulators? Yes. That's what I feel is the situation. Do I feel that our wastewater business is well-run? I do think it is well-run. I think the only things I can say to look at is two things. One is we're further ahead with monitoring of that particular asset class than anybody else in the sector. We're actually at over 80% monitoring of that asset class, whereas actually the second competitor to us is somewhere like 60%.
That shows it is an asset class that we've been focused openly on and working strongly to make sure we have strong performance. The other thing I'd reference is four-star status. One of the key measures of four-star status is compliance to works, and we've been consistently green against that measure. I can, I can't give you more than that, but hopefully that gives you some sense of positivity in terms of our experience and our performance, more critically in that area of our business. Now James is literally ready to pounce. He's ready.
Scribbling away. Yeah.
Go for it.
I think you asked two components. The impact of inflation on RoRE and where you see it, Dominic, is on the financing line. You get this slightly counterintuitive kind of impact on RoRE that even though in-year interest costs rise, they actually, if you've got the right structure in your debt, then you actually see RoRE improve in a higher inflation world. I am expecting to see our RoRE performance improve, not least because of the ODI performance, but also because of the impact of inflation on financing. You will see a higher number this year if inflation continues to be as it's been. In terms of sharing that outperformance, there's no sharing of that outperformance.
That's for us to keep, and it's probably worth kind of reminding you that that sharing kicks in when you have very high levels of gearing, and of course, our gearing is now down in the low sixties, so that doesn't apply to us. Does that answer your question?
Yeah. Thank you very much.
Perfect. Okay, we're gonna head to James Martin next. Martin, Investec.
Yep. Good morning to everybody, and two questions if I can, please. The first gets back to the sewage spill issue, but I guess looking at it in a slightly different way. There is a bit of a narrative from the industry that the rules could have been adhered to, but obviously this has gone up now in the public conscience. What changes do you think we could be thinking about longer term in terms of what requirements might be imposed either by Ofwat or the EA, and what do you think that means in terms of investment for the industry and yourselves? Getting back to inflation, obviously high inflation, you know, feeds through to the consumer pocket.
Just wondered how you square the circle here of affordability of higher inflation on bills. Thanks.
Brilliant. Two really good questions. On the first one, the way that we see this is that we want to be, as a company, a company that adds fantastic quality value to rivers at all stages. If you look at the 25 Year Environment Plan, it gives a really perfect detailed outline. It's now passed into law, hasn't it? It gives a perfect outline over a 25-year period of what every sector has got to do to get to ecologically good river status. The ambition for the nation is to get 85% of rivers to ecological status over a 25-year journey.
What we think the answer is in Severn Trent, which has been open for the last month or so about, is that we would like to make sure that we deliver it in 9 years, not wait the 25 years. Between now and 2030, our commitment to our region, to our customers, to our rivers, is that we'll improve all aspects of our organization to make sure that we deliver all of these things. They're called RNAGs, reasons for not achieving ecological good status, and they're quite a niche little thing up till now, but I suspect they're gonna become mainstream. Your question is, what do I think will change?
One of the things that will change, I think, is that people will talk openly about RNAGs, and that you'll ask us about them, and I'm sure in future results, you'll be saying to us, "How many RNAGs have you improved this year?" In the last year alone, we've actually improved over 10%. This is something we're gonna begin openly reporting is RNAGs, because we think genuinely it's a really important measure, 'cause it shows every aspect of our interrelationship with the rivers, how we're improving. That's one change I think we'll see. I think the second change we'll begin to see is we're in all likelihood likely to have a future investment strategy that invests on an average number of spills.
I think again, when you look to the next AMP, I think you can imagine moving into a conversation topic about that. The CSOs are a critical part of the infrastructure in the U.K. and Europe, so that if we don't have CSOs, then effectively you'll have surface drainage, possibly flooding houses. I think the second big change you might see is an ongoing ambition around reducing the amount of spills that come from CSOs. Now, the water that comes from CSOs, as you know, actually the harm to rivers is very minimal. It's about 3% of the total reasons for not reaching ecological status. But it does, as you say, have high press interest, and it has a really high profile in terms of the eyes of some members of the public.
I think that's likely to be the conversation topic. Two things we'll talk about more, I'm sure, going forward is RNAGs and numbers of spills. Hopefully that helps in terms of giving a sense of where it's going. In terms of affordability, I mean, we're passionate about this, right?
Yeah.
James is gonna jump in.
Yeah, absolutely. Affordability is absolutely at the heart of our customer offering. Now, you will have seen in our RNS that, you know, we're now at helping over 160,000 of our customers who are struggling to pay. We have a number of schemes, including the Big Difference Scheme, which has been running for, I think, five or six years now. We've got the Severn Trent Trust Fund, which has GBP 3.5 million that we help customers who are struggling to pay their bills. There is a lot of help.
The other thing to keep in mind is that lots of household bills are rising, but the Severn Trent water bill is one of the lowest utility bills that our customers have at around GBP 1 a day. I think there's a lot of support there already. Another small thing that we're doing, just as an example of the kind of things we're helping to keep our bills affordable. We've got a really big drive on at the moment on voids. Why is that important? Well, if we can identify and rapidly convert those voids into, these are properties that are marked as void, paying customers, then that reduces the average bill for the rest of our customers.
We've got a really big drive on voids as well. I think the overall package is one that I think, you know, is very much focused on making sure that our bills stay affordable for all our customers.
Sorry, Shane.
It's probably worth just reminding, when we set our tariffs, we set them based on customer feedback and what they find is affordable, which is around GBP 2-GBP 2.50 per month. That kind of increment isn't material to their lives. That's the basis for the way we've deferred our ODIs. 100%-
Understood. That's the first point I was gonna make, is actually the bill that we set is based on customer feedback of what they can manage, and anything else we manage in terms of when we defer our additional revenues to. That's the first key thing, very different to energy. The other thing I think is different to energy is overall for this five-year period, the water sector's bills were decreasing for that five-year period across the sector. That's a marked difference to what's gonna happen in the other utility bills, and also, to be fair, in the other telecoms bills. I think there are actually quite a few fundamental differences.
That's one of the things we need to do a really good job of talking up, is how different it is between the various utility sectors right now in terms of the policy decisions that we're making. Very good. Okay, Martin is happy. I'm gonna move on now to Jenny.
Hi, morning, everyone. A couple of questions, please. Just firstly on the ODIs. Liv, you've refrained from sort of giving an uplift in ODI targets before ahead of winter, obviously depending on weather and how cold it gets and how many pipes burst, et cetera. Can you just talk to us how comfortable you are in meeting that GBP 75 million as we stand without knowing what the weather brings? Secondly, just on inflation, we talked about energy. Can you also talk about chemicals and other costs for other parts of the sort of the cost and whether there is any supply chain issues in getting hold of chemicals? Then just lastly, going back to the sort of waste investigation and data breaches, et cetera.
If we turn it on its head, is there a way we can think of that, you know, that comes out of this investigation could actually help the more efficient providers that, you know, that could create a growth opportunity for the likes of Severn Trent? Thanks.
I'll take the last one first. I think we've got to view this as going through the investigation. I think long-term RCV growth, I think is already a very strong given in the sector anyway. I think if we look at some of the likely challenges coming up against us, whether it's population growth in the U.K., which means you invest in infrastructure, supply-demand, because we want to make sure there's more water readily available for the long term, with abstraction licenses limiting what you can take from rivers. If you look at the fact that bathing rivers, for example, we're building to this AMP, I think they're becoming a real cause célèbre across the U.K. People want more wild swimming and more investment. I think there are lots of reasons to have confidence and faith in long-term RCV growth.
I don't think we should link that straight to the investigation. I think, you know, for the moment, we'll complete the wastewater investigation, hopefully as promptly as possible. Separately to that, I think you can feel confident in long-term growth of the sector from an RCV perspective. I wouldn't wanna end up looking to be linking the two. In terms of the other two then, I'm gonna hand to James because I think you're right. We do sometimes say, and it's still true this year, that a hard winter will definitely cost you. We say openly, it could be, you know, GBP 50 million-ish on ODIs is what a hard winter will cost you. That remains the case. Actually, things have improved on a whole range of things.
I'll get James since he has delivered all the hard work to talk about it, which is why we decided that it was right to stick to guidance right now. Over the last couple of months, quite a number of things have gone our way. I'll let James talk about the hard work his team has delivered, and then I'll hand to Helen to talk about supply chain.
Thank you, Liv. Yeah, as you're aware, we have uplifted guidance. I think the most important aspect for us, though, is actually the fact that over 90% of our measures are actually on or ahead of target. I think that for us is a key underlying stability in our overall performance trend. We've seen some really good performance improvements across water, and we've sustained that through summer. As you know, summer can always be a challenging period for us. We've also managed to really keep the momentum that we've had through AMP six and through the first year of AMP seven in our waste area. That's given us real confidence that we can get through the winter period with some risks, but we're confident that we've built up resilience over the period of time.
Throughout that time, we've managed to really use data to identify challenges in our network and make sure we address those proactively, but also think about how do we involve customers in our overall performance. If you think about the wastewater space, for instance, we've really worked hard within our local communities to educate customers on the sorts of things that they can put down into the sewer network that can then cause problems. We've got multifaceted approach across all aspects of our performance, underpinned with some real new and exciting innovation across the piece, which is why we're confident.
Very good. I'm handing over to Helen now to talk about why we're still sure that we've got the costs under control regardless of inflation.
Yeah. I guess we're shielded to an extent from inflation. Some of our contracts are index-linked, but some are fixed-price, so we have a mixture in our portfolio. We also, as you remember going back, we stocked up when Brexit was happening, and we did that again through COVID. So we've got a stockholding. The other thing that we've done to protect our capital program, and we did earlier this year, was to secure manufacturing slots and pre-order critical components. That's given us some shielding as well. On things like chemicals, we are seeing some inflation as a result of energy prices. So we are seeing some of that come through. But again, we've got a mixture of index-linked and fixed-price contracts.
We are shielded to an extent on that. In terms of supply issues, we're not seeing any major issues there across the supply chain at all.
Very good. Does that answer all your questions, Jenny?
Perfect. Thank you very much.
Excellent. Verity, you're next.
Yeah, good morning. I've got a couple of questions. The first one is about your annuity assets that you've just bought in this new policy. And I noticed it. Did it cost GBP 111 million in cash? I'm just looking through your notes, if you just confirm that. I just wanted actually a follow-up on ODI rewards indexation. So if they're rolled over, they're indexed, right? Can you just confirm that? Because I was interested in that. The other thing I just wanted to ask, which is, a more long-term question about your environmental plans. How are the trees and peatland restoration reflected in RCV, if you could just remind us. Thank you.
Very good. Okay, James, annuity assets.
Yes. It didn't cost that much, Verity. You'll be relieved to hear. I think the actual cash cost is around GBP 5 million. It was a very modest cash payment. The benefit, of course, of doing that is that we now have effectively an insurance policy that covers the risks for that mirror image scheme. It's a really effective way to de-risk. It is a small part of our pensions portfolio, but it's just another part of the kind of de-risking journey that we've been going through.
Very good. James, you wanna talk about ODI rewards and how they get rolled?
Yeah. ODIs are indexed and adjusted for time value of money. That answers that question. In terms of the trees.
PR14 separated the type of expenditure in RCV growth. It's based on your pay-as-you-go rate that we work out independently. Ofwat will apply that rate to our totex spend. Think of it as I can't recall off the top of my head. Roughly 65% is fast money, and the rest goes on the RAB.
Don't think you don't have to do that straight divide of CapEx/OpEx. It's TotEx now, and so it rolls up. Yes, all spend. For example, peak and restoration and trees, they are an RCV growth rate. I guess it's fair to think about it in that sense. Very good. Okay, we're back to Dom.
Yes. Hi there. Just a couple of quick follow-up questions for me. Firstly, on totex, I might have missed this one, but you're saying that your performance is improving. Could you give some guidance on your RoRE expectations on totex? Basically, the totex allowances do rise in line with inflation. As long as inflation is greater than the underlying cost structure, we should see a gap widening there. Can you just confirm that one? Secondly, on M&A, there's been quite quiet from the Ofwat front . It wasn't that long ago, we were potentially looking at WASC/WASC merger or, you know, obviously you bought, you know, Dee Valley and there's a couple other sort of water, smaller ones going.
Do you think that we're in a bit of hiatus at the moment on sort of corporate activity on sort of consolidation in the industry? Yeah.
Can't comment on others on the M&A piece, right? I'm not sure what there is to say on that. I guess, you know, we've been open that we think that the right opportunities for us to spend money at the moment are Green Recovery and fantastic ODI performance. We see that gives us growth. The Green Recovery, which was GBP 624 million worth of award, it's like buying a reasonable sized Water Only, actually, to be fair, and that's no risk growth on our own base, in our own patch with our own people working through it. That's our total attention at the moment, is successfully delivering Green Recovery. ODIs, you keep all the upside. They're things customers really care about most, and they put you in a stronger space, right? They make you more efficient.
Typically, if you're performing well on your measures, you are more efficient, which helps you with the cost base the next time around, and you have less waste in your business because you're getting things right first time. That's our focus.
Yeah.
Probably worth asking others if they've got different focus areas.
Yeah.
On um-
Yeah. On TotEx, I think, Dom, our ambition is to spend our allowance, right? I think we've been very clear that over the five-year period, you know, your expectation should be, and our ambition is to spend all of the money we've been given because we've got lots of great things that we want to do. I think it's been very clear that when we spend our TotEx, you will see benefits in improved service, you'll see benefits in ODIs. So the ambition is to spend that TotEx. To the extent that you get a little bit of a higher inflation and some of the good deals that Helen's done, I think, that gives you a little bit of a tailwind when it comes to TotEx investment.
I think I can find, or James can find lots of good investment opportunities for me to spend that money that will translate into better performance and better ODIs.
I think it's fair to say that our call, which that's our strategy to do that, it's one of the reasons why the ODI is a sector-leading, right? GBP 79 million in the first year and at least GBP 75 million this year. We think that's partly because we have chosen to spend that money well, spend it wisely, go early in terms of the IRE spend. We think it's helping us, and we think that'll be the right call on all of our asset classes. You know, waste is our leading sector business. That's why we're considered the sector leader. Water's got fantastic momentum, and I think that will prove to be the case that that spend was a good thing to do. Over to Bartek now.
Hey, good morning. Just two questions, if I may. Firstly, long-term. If we look at two developments: A, you have the RCV growth and consequently allowed revenues increase going forward for the next, whatever, 10, 20 years. On the other hand, there is a pressure to decrease the water consumption. As a result, the bill per liter of water consumed should be increasing. How do you think it will be working in the future? I mean, do you think the billing will change into more fixed tariffs versus variable tariffs? I mean, I just wonder what's your view on this one. Secondly, we are talking about GBP 75 million of ODIs in the second year of AMP.
What do you think, or what benchmark does it give to or what basis does it give to ODIs in the last year of AMP, where actually some of them are back-end loaded? Thank you.
Great questions. We've always said that there is an extra GBP 50 million in the last year of the AMP, and that still remains the same. There are end amount measures. There is an extra GBP 50 million. We've been open on that since the start, and that remains true still to now. Now, of course, that will roll over into the next AMP because any measures in years four and five roll over into the next one, but our guidance remains unchanged on that point. In terms of the first one, it's interesting, and I know that Shane would just jump in as well. I mean, I think the way you've got to view this is that is that water is cheap. I mean, that's just the reality.
When you look at, you know, everything you get for GBP 1 a day, water is very cheap, and the per liter of water is very cheap, right? You'd have to go up quite a lot for water not to become still cheap. One of the interesting things with COVID is that COVID actually means that really working on consumption has become very hard work. You know, we've actually seen over the last couple of years, people have really come back to whether it's washing their hands for longer every day, whether it's, you know, more water is being used domestically. Actually, that is the case. We would welcome the chance to look at innovative long-term tariffs. That's always been our situation, and we've done some good strategic work on that. I'll get Shane to jump in.
I think key point is we're just being designated as water stressed, so we'll be rolling out more metering, so we won't be moving to a world where you just have a fixed charge. We'll have more unit rates because that helps us drive demand. I think don't expect to see more fixed rates. We'll have more metering, more metering penetration that will allow us to be more innovative in our charges.
Does that answer your question, Bartek?
Yeah, it does. Thank you.
Very good. Okay, let's see if we've got any more questions coming through. We do. Verity's back.
Just a really high level question, actually. I mean, you sat in front of the Environment Select Committee along with your peers. Excuse the pun, but do you think the climate has changed on allowing bill increases to actually fix environmental problems? Or are we still at the same old, same old, you know, must get bills down? Did you get any sense that there's more encouragement from politicians and your customers to actually spend more to fix things?
I think my answer to that, and I'll let others say if they want to jump. First, that would be, you know, doing your job well at the basics is what every customer should expect and what every regulator expects. I think that should be done within our current allowances. We are confident that we already run a good company and a strong performance, and we deliver all of our commitments across all parts of our business. That's the first part, and that should happen right now. There is then a different debate that says, "Do you want more?" Typically, you know, increased RCV and increased investment, it's for more, it's for the next wave at the frontier. Whether it is a, you know...
I think the types of areas where we will see more RCV growth and we will see a change is things like bathing rivers. We're doing two right now as part of the Green Economic Recovery. It feels to me that the mood music for the public has moved. They would like to see bathing rivers within, I don't know, 50 kilometers, 50 miles of every single person's house in the U.K. Feels like the type of thing that does actually exist in Europe and might be something that might change here. I think that kind of step change in the environment or, for example, net zero water supplies. People all accept, all of our customers want us to be net zero. They love the fact we've got that ambition, and they probably also acknowledge that that requires some investment.
I think investment in net zero is another situation that you can imagine RCV growth off of the future. Done well, done very, very judiciously as to how it's delivered, but I think the nation does want the planet protected. I think that is good RCV growth. Doing your day job and actually having been funded to do your day job well for a long period of time has to be managed within the models and with your current performance. I think the select committee just re-emphasized that. There is a desire for maybe us to help solve other nationwide issues, and in solving those, that's a new ask. That new ask will come with funding. Good. Ace. Shall we see any more questions? No, only had that one online, so none since then online. Very good. Marvellous.
I think that is us done. I'll just give another two seconds just to wrap up. A big thank you for lots of wide-ranging questions across the piece. Thank you to the team for all their hard work over the last six months in delivering those results. With that, I'm gonna call it a wrap. Thank you very much for dialing in today, and we look forward to seeing all of you over the course of next time and visiting our investors over the next couple of weeks. Thank you very much.
Thank you.