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slash voucher to claim this offer now. Terms apply. This week, thousands of homes in Kent and Sussex

have found themselves without access to water for days on end. Hello and welcome

to reality check. Less spin more stats. I'm Michael Simmons, the Spectator's economics editor,

and today to discuss this and some predictions for the year ahead, I'm delighted to be joined

by the Spectator's business editor, Martin van der Weir.

Martin, thanks very much for joining Reality Check.

We wanted to have you on to discuss this water crisis, because in your first column,

your any other business column of the new year for the spectator,

you made some predictions of what was going to happen.

And you said there was going to be further crisis in the water industry.

And here we are, you know, just a week on.

And that's come spectacularly true with this crisis in the southeast.

Isn't this evidence that private investment, private ownership doesn't work when it comes

to utility companies? Not entirely, but it's a pretty vivid example of what can go wrong. So

South East Water is currently in the throes of its second crisis of the winter. It had one

a few weeks ago, which was to do with water quality,

where people were having to have their water delivered in bottles, Tumbridge Wells and elsewhere.

...